“No, I didn’t go out much yesterday. A cold day is a good time to read. I was in front of the fire with an old revolutionary novel by a guy named Azuela. It’s old-fashioned, but …”
-Overheard in an Ajijic restaurant.
Refreshing and encouraging. But if Mariano Azuela is old-fashioned (in the novel “The Underdogs”), how can he be of use to us? Short answer (dodging cultural, intellectual and, especially, economic downsides of fashion) is context. As U.S. political and economic chaos continues, serious analysts there speak increasingly of “context.” Because it’s the major tool in understanding life. If we as foreigners wish to have any idea of where we are in what is a very different world, then context is critical. Azuela provides the context of Mexican literary growth, and exposed the corruption that infected the post-Revolutionary era and continues to maim Mexico now.
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PART II: Jalisco’s Azuela charted the Revolution’s fate from the battlefield. Result: that painful transformation’s first authentic novel |
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