Felipe Fernández-Armesto is Professor of Global Environmental History at Queen Mary, University of London, and a member of the Faculty of Modern History at Oxford University. He is also Principe de Asturias Chair in Spanish Culture and Civilization at Tufts University.

Columbus had been the subject of many biographies, but the approach of Columbus on Himself is unique. Fernàndez-Armesto has created, as far as it is possible, an account of Christopher Columbus's life based on his own words. Columbus left far more potentially autobiographical writings than his contemporary explorers from the age of European expansion, but there are gaps in the record. Fernàndez-Armesto has arranged Columbus's writings chronologically so readers can see Columbus's development, and intersperses them with his insightful commentary. The translations are Fernàndez-Armesto's own. Recommended. --R. Fritze, Athens State University, in Choice