MetaChat - Recommendations for books on Mexico's history?

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05 March 2007

Recommendations for books on Mexico's history? I was researching and writing up a short overview of Mexico's history this weekend, and I was fascinated -- both by the history itself, and by how ignorant I was of most of it. Anyone have any good literary history/non-fiction recommendations for remedying that? →[More:]I'm most interested in post-Conquest to modern-day, because I feel like I have read a fair amount on the Aztecs, Olmecs, and Maya, but ancient stuff's ok, too.

post by: occhiblu at: 12:42 | 4 comments

I saw The Life and Times of Mexico by Earl Shorris in a bookstore and it looked very interesting and I put it on my "to read someday" list.

1491 is brilliant, but it's probably more in the latter category that you mention.

posted by matildaben 05 March | 12:47

Alma Guillermoprieto is one of the great living journalists/essayists, and though her collected work generally encompasses all of Latin America, you'll find sections on Mexico in her books; her essays about Mexico are often published in The New York Review of Books as well. She has a Didionesque knack for mixing currency with history in such a way that one explains the other, and both are compelling.

For a full historical overview, no English language texts beat Michael Meyer's The Course of Mexican History. Of course, it's 800 pages, but so what? It's good. If you're looking for a survey, this is it.

I also recommmend Juan Rulfo's novel, Pedro Paramo. Don't read too much about it; just read it.

posted by Hugh Janus 05 March | 13:35

So Far From God The U.S. War With Mexico, 1846-48.

posted by matteo 05 March | 16:57

How about Thomas More's Magician, by Toby Green, an account of of the first ever practical utopian in Mexico, (Quiroga)?

posted by dhruva 05 March | 20:32

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