What’s more, he wrote it without ever setting foot in Mexico! Most people know Jules Verne (1828-1905) as one of the pioneers of science fiction writing. His most famous works include Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea (a submarine voyage with Captain Nemo as the enigmatic hero), A Journey to the Center of the Earth (in which Prof Lidenbrock […]
Continue ReadingI was recently invited to write the prologue for a book on Mazatlán history, with the condition that I relate Mazatlán to Europe. As a Mazatleco who has been living in Switzerland since 1982, I felt half-fit for the job. My suggestion was that the prologue should relate Mazatlán to both Europe and the United States. […]
Continue ReadingIt never ceases to amaze me the number of American tourists who visit Mexico every year with only a thick paperback mystery novel packed away to indulge in while sunbathing on a beach. Rather than titillate the spirit with murder and intrigue, why not take along a book that will help you navigate more smoothly […]
Continue ReadingEula died during the rainy season, when the earth is soft and moist and a grave is easy to dig. Esperanza said that the damp weather was hard on the ancianos, and indeed, in those months, many a house in town bore over its gate the black ribbon which in central Mexico signifies a death in the […]
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Continue ReadingFather Alonso Ponce and Friar Antonio de Ciudad Real were probably Mexico’s first ever tourists. Father Alonso Ponce de León arrived in Veracruz in September 1584 and spent the next five years traveling to every corner of New Spain as Visitor of the Franciscan Provinces. In this time, he visited all 166 Franciscan monasteries in […]
Continue ReadingMany readers of MexConnect have discovered these illuminating words by Octavio Paz: “In the United States the word death burns the lips, but the Mexican lives close to it, jokes about it, caresses it, celebrates it, sleeps with it, it is his favorite toy.” Those words are echoed in the translator’s (John Oliver Simon’s) introduction […]
Continue ReadingFor families being relocated to Mexico, also see Moving to/Living A New Time For Mexico , 1996-2006 , by Carlos Fuentes (Marina Castaneda, translator). Published by Farrar Straus & Giroux. Available through: Amazon Books. This collection of essays by Carlos Fuentes, Mexican intellectual, man of letters and erstwhile diplomat, seeks to place his country’s current […]
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