Letters to the Editor
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About time
For years, I've argued with my wife that Mexico has been a hotbed of literary and artistic achievement, which fuels my desire to take a trip to Mexico City, drink cocaine tea and find a snazzy joint to smoke in.
She's told me time and again that I'm crazy.
It's nice to know I'm not the only one to realize this.
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My introduction to Mexico
As a child, and even today, the magic of Mexico was communicated to me by Ray Bradbury, in his book The Halloween Tree, which introduced me to the Day of the Dead. It's still in my list of favourite books. And this is the kind of storytelling that will stick with a child throughout her (or his) life.
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Nothing new here
I suppose the need to mystify Mexico continues. There is nothing new to this review of the image of Mexico. America's adopted stereotype of Mexican immigrants is fed by such depictions of anything and everything south of the border. We see it in film as well. Whenever a storyline dips into Mexico, the subject of witchcraft, drugs and alcohol swell to excite the reader or the viewer.
Mexico is almost never seen as a country with a rich tradition but as one with a "dark" one. And your review of these classics promotes the same tired stereotypes.
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where are the mexicans?
odd that you lefties at salon would present a guide to the literature of mexico that mentions only 3 mexican authors among a host of books by anglos who traveled or lived there briefly. prof. stavans can be forgiven for overlooking the rich wealth of contemporary mexican literature not yet available in translation, or even for stepping over the wildly popular isabel allende (like water for chocolate), but i am frankly startled to read any summary of the literary life of mexico that does not even mention the name of mexico's greatest living writer, carlos fuentes, whose achievement includes landmark works in fantasy/macabre (Aura), high modernism (The Death of Artemio Cruz), epic historical romance (The Campaign), memoir and essay (This I Believe). fuentes' novels are about mexico and mexicans, not about americans and englishmen behaving badly in an exotic foreign setting.
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Thanks jim
I thought the exact same thing. This interest in both reviewing books by those who visit Mexico and ignoring the newer writers result in a continued mystification of Mexican culture.
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Tabasco sauce?
"take not only with a grain of salt but also with a few drops of Tabasco sauce"
There are dozens of very fine domestic hot sauces in Mexico. But the Tabasco brand is Louisiana all the way.
Jeez, how can I trust anything this guy says when he don't know from hot sauce?
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esquivel?
I think you're mistaken. Isabelle Allende wrote La Casa de los Espiritus, not like water for chocalate. Allende is Chilean, Laura Esquivel is Mexican.
Regardless, I don't think that the author here is attempting to discuss great Mexican literature, but a very interesting and rich tradition of European/North and South American writers who travel to Mexico, and what they find there, and Mexico's importance to an international literary community. Think of similar traditions in Prague and Paris. Beckett is not Parisien, yes, but his journey to France is significant for his writing and how we understand modernism/the absurd, etc.
If you want great contemporary mexican literature, Fuentes and Rulfo are interesting, but also try to go outside of the boom and check out Mexico City's urban literature like Ignacio Taibo II and Luis Zapata's El Vampiro en la Colonia Roma
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"you lefties"?
"odd that you lefties at salon would present a guide to the literature of mexico that mentions only 3 mexican authors..."
Oh crap, here we go again.
The concept for the "literary guide" started innocently enough. The editor said, "Wouldn't it be cool if there was a travel guide devoted not to restaurants, hotels and museums, but to the literature of a place? ...
"the Guide promises to recommend the best books -- fiction, history, memoir or otherwise -- to take with you on your travels. ... the Literary Guide will point you to the books that offer the best virtual tours around."
But that's not good enough for a few elitist snobs who wandered into this feature site and immediately started bitching about there not being enough indiginous authors to suit them.
From day one they came here with their snotty, dismissive psudo-intellectual dismissal of other people's taste. They are incensed that no one has delved deep enough to find their favorite author among the recommened.
So instead of just writing a nice letter saying, "I would like to include my favorite Mexican/Chinese/Dutch author among your recommendations, they are compelled to shit on the editor: "How dare you be so stupid and zenophobic as to not recommend MY favorite, you stupid LEFTIES."
Never mind that HIS favorite is written in native Nauruan and badly translated if at all, and it might take you a year or more to find a copy in a rare book store.
Then there was the conceited snob who huffed that she had spent more time in (insert country name here) than the travel writer who had the audacity to recommend anything when after all, SHE is the true expert and nobody should recommend any book about a place unless they understood the local culture as deeply as SHE does.
This feature was started not as the complete graduate-level bibliography of world literature, but as a quick guide to a book or two you might like to read while jammed into your 24" wide airline seat on a 20-hour flight to South Africa.
Lighten up.
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The Mayan Book of the Dead
Try the Popol Vuh, too. It's the Mayan Book of the Dead and has the most bizaare way of telling stories and preserving ancient myths. It's written in a kind of choral way, with more than one narrator talking at a time, and telling stories in a fragmented, almost completely angular, but straightforward way. It was meant (the written form at least) to preserve Mayan mythology and trick the conquistadors who were wiping it away, or take swipes at them at least. The translation to read is by Dennis Tedlock.