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MARIANO AZUELA
MARIANO AZUELA
Before Revolution
A son of don Evaristo Azuela and dona Paulina Gonzalez,
Mariano Azuela was born on 1 January 1873 in Lagos de
Moreno, state of Jalisco in Mexico. With the help of 300
pesos as loan from some wealthy brother, don Evaristo Azuela
opened a grocery store "EL Tigre" in Lagos where the child
Mariano Azuela started taking his first lessons from the
encounters of his own life with the reality as well as from
those of the common people which were to prove powerful raw
material for his novels. His father was a dynamic person who
expanded his buisness and also bought a ranch (EL Ixtle) .
That is how he could afford to send his son to study
medicine. The childhood adventurous stories narrated to him
by his muleteer maternal grandfather, don Jose Maria
Gonzalez1, not only educated him on still existent colonial
structure raised on injustice and exploitation, but also
left deep psychological mark on his personality to be
reflected with the highest degree of· perfection in his most
celebrated literary work, Los de abajo (The Underdogs).
He began his primary education attending the Liceo de
Padre Guerra at Lagos and later entered the Liceo de Varones
at Guadalajara. Azuela himself describes his childhood days:
1 Salvador Azuela,"De la vida y pensamiento de Mariano Azuela", Universidad {Mexico City), 16 June 1952.
68
As soon as I finished the course of Morals and Religion, I deserted the seminary. The sacerdotal career never interested me and my stay in that establishment was merely accidental. I enrolled in the Boy's Liceo of the State, revalidated the courses that I had taken in Lagos and finished my preparatory studies. When 1 left the seminary, my father suggested that 1 should take a room in the home of Dr Alvarado, where the environment was the same, as the majority of the boarders were theology students .... The next year 1 moved to another boarding house on Belen street very close to the Alameda, at a short distance from the School of Medicine and the General Hospital. Then. 1 began to know Guadalajara, ••• another locale, naturally there were other men and other books - Jorge lsaac's Maria, Gil Blas de Santillana, the horseman D' Artagnan, and the sweet Margarita Gautier.2
It was in Guadalajara as a student that Azuela
developed a strong desire for literature and he dedicated
himself to the literary activities. He started visiting very
frequently the places where the writers like Jose Lopez-
Portillo y Rojas and Victoriano Salado Alvarez used to talk
over a cup of coffee. Here he studied lot of novels with
special interest of French writers. like Daudet, Goncourt,
Zola, etc, Zola had greatly influenced Mariano Azuela. A
literary group of poets called Farautes (Herald) was
increasing its literary activities in many cities of the
province. They were holding regular monthly meetings in
which the members of the group used to present their
writings and hold discussions. Occasionally a magazine
called Calendas was also published. Mariano Azuela was
keenly participating in all these literary activities.
2 Mariano Azuela, Pagias autoiograficas (Mexico City, Fondo de Cultura Econ6mica, 1974), pp. 189-91.
69
It gives us fairly good idea about the circumstances in
which Azuela did his schooling and finished his medicdl
studies in 1899. He began practising as a medical doctor at
Lagos de Moreno in 1909 and, the following year, married
Carmen Rivera, the niece of the famous historian, Father
Agustin Rivera. From Sra Carmen Rivera, Azuela had five sons
and five daughters.
Since 1908, Azuela has become a strong supporter of
Francisco I. Madero. He was also a regular reader of
opposition's magazine Mexico Nuevo. During the election
campaign in 1910, he was one of the most important
campaigners of Madero. When Madero was imprisoned in the
summer of 1910, Azuela sent him a manifesto of solidarity.
After Diaz's victory in the election, he hung Madero's
portrait on his window for which he had to go underground
for some time. His clinic was a regular meeting place for
the supporters of the Revolution where they used to discuss
day-to-day political developments and plan their strategies
accordingly. Subsequently, the Maxio Serdan club was also
formed. After Diaz 's surrender in May 1911, Azuela along
with several citizens of Lagos gave a warm civic reception
to Madero. In the city-hall, he gave an emotional speech and
severely attacked the opportunists of Diaz regime and
cautioned the people not to let them rise to power any more
and corrupt the revolutionary movement heading for country's
70
renovation. He had become conscious of the fact that he was
to dedicate himself to the cause of Malero whom he had been
admiring since 1908.
In 1911, just for one_month, Azuela also served as jefe
politico in Canton de Lagos. Until 1914, he served smoothly
as a practising doctor when Villa and Carranza jumped into
fray to snatch the power from Huerta's hands. "Once 1
determined to be a part of the revolutionary movement that
Francisco I. Madero initiated, I ·entered it. I was never
interested in or has sympathy with politics of force, but in
the action against the ancient regime of Porfirio Diaz my
heart dominated my mind. I do not regret it nor have I ever
regretted it",3 said Azuela. In 1911, he was designated as
director of public education for the State of Jalisco. After
Madero was assassinated on 22 February 1913, he joined
Pancho Villa's army as doctor and went to Guadalajara. When
the Convention of rebel forces taking place at
Aguascalientes was denounced by Carranza, Azuela along with
the troops of Julian Medina, the governor of Jalisco, went
to Lagos and remained there until May 1915. When that year
they met with an attack from Carranza's forces, they had to
retreat to Aguascalientes and Guadalajara. Azuela was
attending on the wounded at Chihuahua in October 1915 when
Carrancistas reached Ciudad Juarez and he had to cross the
3 Ibid., p. 107.
71
border to El Paso, Texas "with a bunch of papers under my
rough cotton shirt". 4 It was this process of closely
observing and experiencing the Revolution that Mariano
Azuela was able to give the whole episode a novelistic shape
in the form of_ Los de abajo by publishing it in series first
in El Paso del Norte's issues from October to December 1915.
This effort of his earned him only twenty dollars. "My
defeat was two-fold: I had lost economically as well; all my
savings for the past ten years went up in smoke and without
indeals, full of disenchantment 1 had to face the reality
and perform my immediate and pressing duty--the maintenance
of my family"5, Said the author himself.
Withdrawing completely from the active political life,
Azuela had to return to his medical profession to support
himself as well as his family. In 1916, he brought his
family to Mexico City and talked to a drugstore to send him
patients looking for a doctor. Somehow few patients started
reaching him. His wife, dona Carmen,gives us some idea about
Azuela's routine life in Mexico City:
A little before six in the morning, he began to work at his typewriter. Usually he wrote a page every day if he was not correcting proofs for his editor, Andres Botas. · He was a generous man, full of kindness. From the very moment he started to practice medicine, he preferred the poor patient whom he never abandoned even though he did not pay his doctor's bill. He also took care of the
4 Ibid., p. 128.
5 Ibid., p. 138.
72
bullies and 'tough-guys' {whose patois is found in his novels) . More than once these petty-gangsters would steal his handkerchief, hat and even money in his office.6
Azuela' s literary taste developed when he was still
studying at the Convent of the Capuchines at Lagos. "In
between the boxes of soap I hid well some of the novels,
such as The Count of Montecristo, economic editions editted
in Barcelona .... When my father used to snore during his
siesta comfortably lying on a bed, I hid myself in the attic
to enjoy the forbidden book"7 , later wrote Azuela. These
literary lessons learnt at his father's grocery store took a
"first literary triumph" when he wrote a long letter to his
family members. Azuela himself gives a description of it:
If during my childhood the execution of my grandfather had made an impression on me, the assassination of don Ramon Corona, the Governor of the state, gave me a similar reaction -- though now in such a manner that I could transform it into my first literary triumph. I wrote a long letter to the members of his family relating to them the details of that important event. Perhaps I added many exaggerations and even lies because I found out that the neighbours of my village passed the account from one to another.B
From the beginning of the independence movement upto
around 1880, there was hardly any difference between the
6 Carmen Rivera, quoted in Mariano Azuela, Two Novels of Mexico, Lesley Byrd Simpson, trans. {Berkeley, University of California Press, 1957), p.xix.
7 Azuela, n.2, p. 188.
8 Azuela, quoted in Mariano Azuela, Two Novels of Mexico, Lesley Byrd Simpson, Trans. (Berkely, University of California Press, 1957), p. XV.
73
literature in the capital and in the provinces. There was an
organic unity between the capital and the provinces and the
literature that was created during that period looked after
the whole nation's interest. It was only with the beginning
of imperialistic design that the capital was gradually
converted into the seat of 'order and progress'. Thus, the
conflict sharpened with the opening of foreign banks,
industries, other commercial enterprises and new rail lines.
This 'order and progress' that was the outcome of the
Porfirian dictatorship and imitation of alien culture was
being visibly noticed in the Mexican literature. Adalbert
Dessau puts this situation is this way "This relation
between the capital and the interior was of fundamental
significance for the national renovation of the Mexican
literature that followed the Revolution."9
This changing socio-political scene gave birth to
modernism and the so-called realist and naturalist novel ..
But this literature was not representing the whole nation.
In fact, during the Porfirian period, it was the provincial
literature that was closer to the people. However, the
provincial themes of Emilio Rabasa, Heriberto Frias and Jose
L6pez-Portillo y Rojas were noteworthy. But it was not until
the emergence of Mariano Azuela that the Mexican novel
9 Adalbert Dessau, La novela de la Revoluci6n mexicana, Juan Jose Utrilla, trans. (Maxico City, Fondo de Cultura Econ6mica, 1980), p. 130.
74
identified itself completely with the provincial people and
opposed the dictatorial regime vehemently. Zapata's peasant
movement was though based in Morelos, another powerful
centre of revolutionary activities was in the northern
provinces of Coahuila, Chihuahua and Sonora. The movement
that was continuing in Puebla and Veracruz was more
political than military. The states of Central Plateau-
Jalisco, Guanajuato, Aguascalientes, Zacatecas and Michoacan
-- were developing the important literary scene.
The renovation of the Mexican literature was being
carried out by two movements-~one operating in the capital
city and the other in the Central Plateau. The literary
movement in the capital was centred around the Ateneo de la
Juventud and was considered by its propagators the only-·
movement of universal approach. In the Central Plateau,
there were various literary groups that kept themselves well
informed not only of the literary activities taking place in
the capital but also of France and other foreign countries.
The principal protagonists of the Central Plateau literary
movement were advocate Manuel Jose Othon (1858-1906) of San
Luis Patosi, Guadalajara's doctor Enrique Gonzalez Martinez
(1871-1952), Jerez's advocate and professor of literature-
Ramon Lopez Velarde (1888-1921), and Lagos de Moreno's
chemist--Francisco Gonzalez Leon (1862-1945). They were all
poets, but Lagos de Moreno's doctor Mariano Azuela (1873-
1952) was a novelist. All of them struggled hard for
75
fulfilling their literary aspirations and the renovation of
the Mexican literature got matured in the literary works of
Mariano Azuela.
After Azuela returned to Lagos in 1899 and opened his
clinic, his evenings were generally spent at Antonio Moreno
y Oviedo's place. There he used to find solace away from the
monotonous work of a doctor. At the same time, he continued
his literary activities and kept himself abreast of the
literary happenings. In 1903, along with his two friends and
with considerable difficulties, he was able to organise the
first Juegos Florales (poetry competition). Here his De mi
tierra was given an award. Although this activity was purely
literary for the farautes, it was related to the common
people and Azuela 1 s characters were presenting socio
political problems of the nation.
The formal and real process of Azuela 1 s literary
writings had begun during his college years when, in 1896,
he wrote Registro, Paginas intimas and impresiones de un
estudiante that were published in a weekly Gil Bias C6mico
of Mexico city. Esbozo was published in 1897. In fact, about
seventeen pages of Registro had already been written in 1889
when Azuela was barely sixteen years old. these costumbrista
writings also depicted the concern Azuela felt for the poor
and the humble. Whatever he wrote during those days, born
with irony and good humor. Form De mi tierra and Pinceladas,
76
both appearing in 1903, Azuela broke with the costumbrista
style of objective writing and started depicting the misery
of the Indian who was being used as a pawn to enrich his
hacendado. What he learnt as a student in Guadalajara,
attending patients in a public hospital, observing other
students' activites, found vent in Maria Luisa published in
1907. Luis Leal considers Maria Luisa more a long story than
a nove1.10
For his style, Azuela's works are generally divided in
two groups. In the first group fall his themes of diverse
social nature. In Pinceladas the religious story of some
devout widows is narrated, while in De mi tierra a hacendado
seduces the fniancee of a peasant. In Victimas de la
opulencia (1904) a nanny lets her own son die for the cause
of her master's son. This is Azuela' s first work where
scathing social protest is registered. Here, he not only
attacks the upper class for committing injustice, but also
states that having sumbitted herself to injustice, the
mother was also responsible for her son's death. In En
derrota . ( 1904) , Camilla is peasant Juan's fniancee whom a
ranchero's son abducts on the wedding night. Juan cannot
bear this shock and commits suicide. Lo que se esfuma (1907)
is a story of a craftman' s son Per ico and a butcher's
daughter Lupe. Perico goes to study in Mexico City and when
10 Luis Leal, Mariano Azuela :Vida y obra (Mexico City, Ediciones de Andrea, 1961), p. 37.
77
comes back home for a vacation, refuses to recognise his old
friends for rich people's sons. He even speaks bad of his
old girlfriend Lupe. Perico treacherously kills Lupe' s new
boyfriend--Andres. Lupe gets married to an old but rich man.
She becomes a rich lady after her husband dies. In the last
episode, Perico and Lupe are shown to be getting married. In
his work Azuela exposes the valueless life -style of the
upper class.
Avichuelos negros (1909} narrates the story of a young
unmarried couple. The young man is a textile worker and
contracts tuberculosis. He is separated from the young girl
and dies in isolation. This work differs from the previous
ones for it has wider social canvas. While exposing the
terrible unhealthy conditions of the workers, Azuela also
underlines the need to take care of the sicks.
The second group of Azuel' s works mainly consists of
poetic descriptions of atmosphere, nature, scenery, etc.
Nochistongo was written in 1905. The poetical description of
Mexico's landscapes travelling in a train that passes
through steep hills and plains is splendid. The writer also
paints the shiver of fear when the train crosses over the
steep cliffs. Loco appeared in 1907. This is a sketch of a
musician beggar in the street who is laughed at foolishly by
some onlookers. The human sensibility of the writer in this
way finds poetic expression of a situation that agitates his
78
heart and mind. Among other poetic sketches of different
social colours and environments that appeared in 1908 are
Brochazos, De paso and Del arroyo.
In Brochazos Azuela paints the profound peace of a
fertile mother's dusk and in De paso tries to peep into the
heart of a blonde who is a telegraph operator and whom he
finds sad and pensive. Del arroyo describes the lonely noon
of a beggar who is the tragic incarnation of isolation and
social hatered for the writer. Azuela becomes his spokesman
and makes a scathing attack on the society. The atmospheric
poetic sketches of Azuela seem to be closer to the lyrics of
Baudelaire and Parnaso. It was a typical contribution mainly
of provincial writers to the Mexican literature.
In "Maria Luisa" Azuela gives a literary account bf the
real seduction and abandonment of a daughter of his boarding
house proprietress by one of his friends. One day, he finds
her on a death bed in a public hospital where Azuela was
serving his internship. Maria Luisa falls in love with a
silly boy. She leaves her mother's house in order to live
with her lover. After a short enjoyment, Pancho, her lover,
leaves her and falls for another girl Esther. Maria Luisa
tries to take shelter in alcohol and takes to prostitution
for about three years. Finally, she finds way to a
sanatorium to die miserably. Ernest R. Moore analyses Maria
Luisa as follows:
79
The poverty of images, the overworking of contrasts and retrospection, the abruptness of transition from chapter to chapter, the occasional outright condemnation of a character, among the defects found in this novel, can be ascribed to Azuela's inexperience. Better novelists have done worse in their first works. To his credit is the excellent analysis of Maria Luisa's thoughts as she makes the momentous decision to run off with Pancho and again when she realizes that she has lost him to her rival, Esther. Some pages equal in descriptive beauty any of the writings being done at this time in Mexico, and chapter VI represents Azuela near his best in technique, in elegance of lanfuage, and in realistic reproduction of mind and milieu. 1
Maria Luisa is a novel on the pattern of a naturalist
Mexican school that was under the influence of the French
novelists of the period. "My humble Maria Luisa was the
blood sister of Mini Pinson, of Margarita Gautier, of
Mussatan12, remarked the novelist. What happened to Maria
Luisa was not any creation of the writer to condemn a
character of that kind from the point of view of a religious
morality, it was his commentary on the society and the
people at larger that made her suffer:
On awakening to her senses, she tells us that she was not able to resist the influence of her race, degenerated and stultified until then by deficiencies of education; finding the remedy for her pains in alcohol; once a step taken, nothing or nobody would be capable of stopping that; dragged by the damned inheritance, she would remain sunk for ever.13
11 Ernest R. Moore,"Novelists of The Mexican Revolution: Mariano Azuela", Mexican Life (Mexico City), vol. 16, no. 8, August 1940, p.22.
12 Azuela, quoted in Ernest R, Moore, "Novelists of the Mexican Revolution", Mexican Life , vol. 16, no. 8, August 1940, p.23.
13 Azuela, Maria Luisa y otros cuentos (Mexico city, Ediciones Botas, 1938), p. 102.
80
Luis Leal, the most famous critic of the novels of the
Mexican Revolution, has also touched upon this fact: "His
( Azuela' s) interest is found in the social protest, in
trying to avoid a situation in which girls like Maria Luisa
are perverted by the rogues of the society, by the fine
gentlemen.n14 The author tries to philosophize Maria's
condition:
Who was Maria Luisa? One of so many flowers open on the dunghill which rise slender, humid and perfumed, which seem to be launching into the sky and which in short, very briefly, twist the ardent rays of the eternal sun of life, separating their withered petals and scattering their putrid seed on the same dunghill that watched it budding.15
This may be discarded as a fatalistic approach to the
problem, yet it is a powerful artistic commentary on the
'dunghill' of the entire social system. The types of
characters woven in the plot of his "short novel are of
today, of yesterday and of always" .16 Therefore, Mariano
Azuela does not seem to be lacking the insight one needs to
depict the social reality with concern in his very first
novel. Maria Luisa "is not read, however, so much for its
literary value as for its historical value, since we find in
that the seeds out of which he is to become the greatest
novelist of the Revolution",17puts his biographer, Luis
14 Leal, n.10, p. 36.
15 Azuela, n. 12, pp. 21-22.
16 Azuela, n.2, p.45.
17 Leal, n.10, p.37.
81
Leal, in a nutshell. There are "technical deficiencies
certainly more noticeable" in Maria Luisa, but it "is
written taking characters and environment from the actual
moment I was then living"18. And that is one of the most
important elements of honest historic value one has to keep
in mind while analysing Azuela's first novel.
"Los fracasados can be considered as the first work of
Azuela in the genre"19, writes Luis Leal. It was though
written in Lagos de Moreno in 1906, could only be published
in 1908. Azuela himself accepted: "With Los fracasados my
novelistic writing ended me with a decision to cultivate the
genre formally".20
The young lawyer, Resendez, after finishing his studies
in Guadalajara reaches Alamos with great enthusiasm thinking
to put his legal studies, that he learnt from his respected
teachers, into practice. He occupies the post of secretary
in the Ayuntamiento (Town Council). The reality around him
opens his eyes. It doensn't take him mtich time to realize
that justice means what suits to the vested interest of the
jefe politico {political chief), the curate, the hacendados.
A priest provokes the people for taking a procession against
the local authorities. The procession does take place, but
18 Azuela, n.2, p.77.
19 Leal, n.lo, p.37.
20 Azuela, n.2, p.91.
82
the priest is apprehended by the police at night. On the
coming Sunday arwther priest agitates people in the mass to
rescue the apprehended priest from the prison. When the
people went into action, the police opened fire on them
resulting one dead and half a dozen wounded. In the evening
calm prevailed on the town. The police commanQant cooly took
out the prisoner in the evening; put him on a train to
Guadalajara for starting there further penal proceedings
against him. The political chief put entire blame on his
secretary and washed his hands of any responsibility in the
matter. As a consequence, the secretary becomes the target
of the people's fury. An attempt is also made on his life
which makes him and his girl-friend, Consuelo, to leave the
town.
The protagonist, Resendez, comes to the conclusion that
"supremacy of intelligence is not the gateway to prosperity,
that victory in life corresponds to mediocrities and even to
incompetence, because one reaches the highest posts neither
through talent nor through knowledge, but through audacity,
intrigue, vileness, shamefulness and madness 11 .21
This was the Porfiriato that Mariano Azuela depicts in
Los fracasados, Even the father Cabezudo of the novel, who
throughout his life condemned the liberals, is shown to have
21 Azuela, Obras completas (Mexico City, Fondo de Cultura Economica, 1958).vol.l, p.80.
83
realized at the end that the real enemy· was not the
liberalism, but "the imbecility and the eternal human
wickednessn22. The protagonist has been modelled on the life
of the novelist's poet friend, Jose Becerral, who gave him
"abundant material not only for Los fracasados but for many
posterior novels .... n23
"The most celeberated of the three pre-revolutionary
novels is Mala yerba", 24 comments Adalbert Dessau. This
novel was published in 1909. In this, the plot is wov.en
around the misdeeds of a Latifundista, Julian Andrade, who
courts with a peasant couple's daughter, Marcela. Julian
Andrade out of jealousy kills his rival, a cowboy. He gets
away unpunished even after committing that murder as Marcela
does not say anything against him before the judge. However,
she abandons him. The stable boy, Gertrudis falls in love
with Marcela but she does not respond favourably. She runs
off to a nearby city with an American engineer, who was
working on Julian's hacienda. Gertrud is and Marcela again
meet each other and start living together for some time.
Julian Andrade cannot digest Gertrudis living happily with
Marcela and plans to get rid of him for ever. He promises
him good job and makes him to come to his hacienda where he
is coolly assassinated by Julian's informer, Tio Marcelino,
22 Ibid., p.l51.
23 Azuela, n.2, p. 86.
24 Dessau, n.9, p. 184.
84
in reward of a fine horse. Julian also murders Tio Marcelino
and silences any possible witness against him. Subsequently,
he meets Marcela. When Marcela comes to know about his
crime, she thinks of taking revenge on him. But she suffers
from a fit bout and Julian Andrade assassinates Marcela
while she was unconscious. In the absence of sufficient
proof, the authorities close the file and the latifundista
again goes unpunished.
"Mala yerba is frequently considered as direct
precursor of the novel of the Revolution or as its literary
'pioneer'", says Adalbert Dessau.25 The whole effort is to
unravel the bare truth of hacienda life. Marcela states to
her female neighbours that she did not say anything against
Julian Andrade for the consideration of her family. Azuela
exposes the real intricacies of day-to-day life of a lower
middle class family. The moral values are surrendered for
existence. However, all this does riot make us believe that
Mariano Azuela was in any way wishing to have social
revolution at that historical juncture. The distinct quality
of the novel .lies in the fact that three important elements
--naturalism, comstumbrismo and "mass protagonist"--were
used with literary skill. Azuela did not attack Diaz regime
by painting different atrocities committed by haves on have-
nots. He has rather thrown some hints that matters could
have been much worse without Diaz in power. What he attacked
25 b"d I 1 . , p. 187.
85
were long traditions and customs full of ills that Mexico
inherited from its colonial past.
Sin amor like Los fracasados is a tale of provincial
bourgeois society. The protagonist, Ana Maria Romero, is a
daughter of a Mexican middle class. Her mother's ambitions
are to socialise with rich people in the city and get her
daughter married to one of the rich persons. She tries to
persuade her daughter to marry a rich young bachelor, Ramon
Torralba. Ana Maria resists her mother's offer for quite
some time. Finally, she accepts the offer and marries him
for economic considerations. She gets mo~ey and so-called
social status but without love.
Azuela seems to have considerably matured his thoughts
and literary skill in this novel. The plot of Sin amor is
much more relevant to the Mexican society than that of Los
fracasados. The middle class dilemma is exposed through Ana
Maria's character. She initially resists her mother's
overtures to get her married to a wealthy latifundista, but
after some time succumbs to the glitter of the upper class.
Azuela, at the same time, comments on the realization of
emerging Mexican attitude towards foreign rule and ideas
through one of his characters in a conversation in Sin amor:
"Mexico has always been for the foreigners and not for the
Mexicans. We would enjoy freedom of worship ... "26
26 Azuela, n.21, p. 313.
86
During Revolution
The Mexican Revolution was a turning point in Azuela's
life in general and his literary works in particular. He was
quite clear about the kind of change Mexico required when he
said, 11 ••• The most urgent need of the country was not the
change of a man by another, but of an old, prostituted and
dirty regime by a new, honourable and clean one .... 11 27
Azuela had also seen big latifundistas crossing the
fence and joining the revolutionary movement. They were
conveniently doing it to keep their hegemony intact. After
Madero's assassination, Azuela became pessimistic. However,
whatever he could analyse and understand of this whole
process, he narrated in Andres Perez, maderista:
The Justice is a word, and what else? The electricity till yesterday was lightning that kills and now it is the faithful, obedient servant of this poor naked game. In order to master the electricity, many hundreds of centuries have been necessary; for making something effective of the word Justice, there may be perhaps many millions of centuries •... What I am working for an ideal of justice, it is not important for me to know whether within a hundred or a million of centuries the matter will be over for which I am working. And since people have been able to think so, we have been able to reach a stage superior to the stone age ••• 28
Andres Perez, maderista is considered the first novel
of the Revolution. It is a short novel that was published in
27 Azuela, quoted by A. Leal Cortes Mariano Azuela 11 , Filosofia y Letras 53, 1954, p. 255.
28 Azuela, n. 21, vol. 2, p. 793.
87
in 11 Elog io de (Mexico) , vol.
1911. Andres Perez is a young journalist of Mexico City who
is invited by one of his former classmates, Antonio Reyes,
to visit him and his wife, Maria, at their ranch. Andres
Perez resigns his job and reaches Antonio Reyes's ranch.
Antonio is eager to know about the revolutionary activities
and wants to know everything about them. Andres tells him
whatever he could about the possible revolution. However, he
also states that he is least interested in revolutionary
activities. After some time, when the Revolution breaks out,
Andres decides to go back to Mexico City. Antonio does not
like Andres's behaviour and gets somewhat disillusioned with
his non-seriousness about the Revolution. At the same time,
the district political leader sends for his arrest for
inciting people in the hacienda and working as Francisco I.
Madero's agent. Even Andres perez's friend, Antonio Reyes,
believes him to be an undercover revolutionary agent.
Everyone around takes Andres Perez to be a genuine
revolutionary and a thousand pesos is collected and handed
over to him for the revolutionary cause. While trying to
flee from the town to go to the states for few months, he is
caught by the police on his way to the railway station.
Andres Perez's imprisonment makes him even a greater hero.
Antonio Reyes organizes and leads a revolutionary uprising
at the local level, but unfortunately gets killed. His place
is taken by his administrator, Vicente. After the rebels
take over the local administration and Viecente becomes head
88
of the district, Andres Perez is released from the jail.
Andres Perez watches the whole episode and finds himself
alone to the conclusion that there is hardly any revolution
but only change of heads. At the end, he again takes the
route to the railway station and happens to pass Maria's
doorway. Maria was attracted by Andres since they knew each
other. Perhaps this makes him ~ealize when Maria has become
widow and enters her house.
What Azuela thought of the Revolution is to give
guarantee of social justice to all and healing of the
people's wounds caused by the dictatorship. Azuela is shaken
by noticing that many so-called revolutionaries were
opportunists and were basically counter-revolutionaries.
They did not change their attitude about the suffering
masses. one of the most corrupt characters in Andres Perez,
maderista, colonel Hernandez, incites the peasants to kill
Vicente and states about them: "They were born slaves ... ,
still slaves, slaves till they die .... Eternally slaves! n29
He but becomes general
The importance of Andres Perez, maderista lies not in
the ultimate analysis of the existing socio-political
equations but in painting the objective reality of the
society. While exposing the supporters of the Diaz regime,
those corrupting the revolutionary masses and other lumpen
29 b.d I 1 • , p. 800.
89
elements, Azuela also makes his harsh commentary on
opportunist intellectual like Andres Perez who is the
protagonist of the novel. The political opportunism that was
almost becoming a profession, was to some extent responsible
for undermining the national cause.
Los caciques had been written by the .end of June 1914
but could be published only in 1917. Like in Mala yerba,
here also Azuela narrates the attrocities committed by the
feudal lords of the haciendas in the interior regions of the
province. Azuela finished writing Los caciques when
Zacatecas was taken over by Pancho Villa. The methods used
for the exploitation of the . people by these lords are
revealed in the novel. It is a bit different from Mala yerba
because here exploitation of the middle class is focused.
There is hardly any plot, nor a protagonist in the strict
sense of the term. Juanito Vinas is a small middle class
trader and has wife Elena and daughter Esperanza. With many
hardships, he manages to collect some twenty thousand pesos.
On the advice of the Del Llano brothers, he spends his
capital in the construction of some houses. He hopes to rent
out some eighty houses and collect a hefty amount. Not being
able to complete the construction of the houses, he
mortgages his property to Ignacio Del Llano. Nobody in the
whole city dares to lend him money for fear of Del Llano.
Del Llano pays him a paltry sum and appropriates his entire
90
property. The submissive and confident Juanito Vinas is
completely shattered and dies after some time in distress.
Del Llano family is a big trader of grains. The head of
the family is don Ignacio who is a hardened cacique (boss).
His younger brother, Jermias, is a parish priest who is
venal and lewd and uses his religious position to the
benefit of the family. Their sister, Teresa, is seen in all
charitable meetings.
Another middle class character is Rodriguez· who is a
clerk with the "La Continental". He is a friend of Juanito's
daughter, Esperanza. He is an idealist, sympathiser of the
common people and takes part in all people's movements. He
being a non-conformist neither liked by the revolutionaries
nor by the caciques. In fact, after Madero's assassination,
the members of the 'Del Llano family get him murdered. The
novel ends with the occupation of the city by the
revolutionary forces. When the hacienda is attacked,
Juanito's wife and daughter are shown to set fire throwing
petrol on the new house of the Del Llan family. The question
posed by the idealist middle class character, Rodriguez, in
reality, tells us the author's reaction to the situation.
Azuela also seems to have advanced from his old liberal
ideas .
. . . The Madrismo is now the Revolution, and whole revolution ... carries with itself an inspiration of justice.... supposing the Maderismo triumphs, the Maderismo will commit suicide by converting itself into
91
government--well, the government is nothing but the regulated injustice that all rascals carry in the heart .... It is illogical to be Maderista today and anti-Maderista tomorrow?30
Los de abajo (The Underdogs), the first and greatest of
the novels of the Revolution, has already appeared in more
than twenty languages across the world. It has also been
claimed to be the first of its kind that stimulated the
creation of the subsequent novels of the Revolution in the
literary history of Mexico. Venustiano Carranza gaining the
upper hand in the struggle by the end of 1914, forced the
Villista forces, to which Mariano Azuela was attached as a
medical officer, to withdraw to the northern border of
Mexico by 1915. Forced by the unfavourable circumstances,
Azuela had to cross over the northern border in May 1915. By
October, he reached El Paso with two-thirds of..~the novel
already written. Reaching El Paso only ten dollars in his
pocket, he had to accept a proposal of a Spainsh language
newspaper, El Paso del Norte, to fin ish the rest of his
novel and publish it in that newspaper for only three
dollars a week. The weekly publication of his novel's
chapters lasted from October to December 1915. It was later
published in a book form in 1916. Though it aroused little
notice then, after Azuela started practising as a doctor in
Mexico City, in 1917, Los de abajo was printed twice--first
in the El Mundo de Tampico, a daily newspaper, and later in
a book form by the same publisher.
30 Ibid., p. 812.
92
Even after writing eleven novels and various other
literary pieces, Mariano Azuela was yet to see fame of a
modern novelist with recognised outstanding literary genius.
It was only in December 1924 when Julio Jimenez Rueda
generated a debate by writing an article entiled "El
afeminamiento en la literatura mexicana" (The Effeminacy in
the Mexican Literature). He put a question to the Mexican
writers why "there has not appeared the poetical, narrative
or tragical work which is compendium and summary of the
people's agitations during this whole period of bloody civil
war, impassioned conflict of interests". 31 In response to
this, Francisco Monterde--who also wrote later the prologue
to Azuela's Obras completas (1958-60) published in three
volumes by the Fondo de Cultura Econ6mica--defended the
existence of a Mexican literature and in support of his
argument quoted Mariano Azuela: "I could point out Mariano
Azuela among other novelists hardly known--and who deserve
to be so. Whoever is searching the faithful reflexion of our
last revolutions' blaze has to have recourse to his
pagesn32. This polemics reached such a height that many
illustrious writers like Federico Gamboa, Jose Vasconcelos
and Salvador Novo, in a weekly, El Universal Ilustrado,
31 Julio Jimenez Rueda, "El afeminamiento en la literatura mexicana", El Universal (Maxico City), 20 December 1924.
32 Francisco Monterde, "iEXiste una literatura mexicana viril?", El Universal, 25 December 1924.
93
responded to the question: "l Existe una literatura mexicana
moderna?" (Does a Modern Mexican Literature Exist?). As a
result, El Universal published Los de abajo on 27 December
1924 with an editorial commentary: "Los de abajo--Una
Creaci6n Palpitante de Nuestra Vida--E1 Universal Ilustrado
Ofrece la Unica Novela de la Revoluci6n"33 (The Underdogs--A
Throbbing Creation of Our Life--E1 Universal Ilustrado
presents the Unique Novel of the Revolution) .
That is how Los de abajo came to limelight, and it
still remains one of the most written about novels· in the
history of Spanish American letters. Azuela duly deserves it
whose literary genius "marked the end of one century of the
Mexican novel and introduced a new era. His influence has
been so deep that not even the authors still following the
realist school of the previous century"34 could escape that.
"Los de abajo is Mexico, as Dona Barbara is Venezuela.
Reading Los de abajo we know Mexico: its people, its
landscape, its problems, its aspirations, its defects. The
entire novel reveals the spirit of inconformity of its
author and his desires of seeing Mexico ruled by a state of
major equity and social justice", 35 rightly remarks Luis
Leal.
33 El Universal Ilustrado (Mexico City), 27 December 1924.
34 Pedro Manuel Gonzalez, Trayectoria de la novel a en Mexico (Mexico City, Ediciones Botas, 1951) p. 144.
35 Luis Leal,n. 10, p. 49.
94
The Revolution itself is said to be the protagonist of
Los de abajo. There is some justification in the argument
but Azuela would not make an abstract protagonist. Demetrio
Macias is the principal character, although he may not
fulfil all the conditions for a classical protagonist. He is
an illiterate peasant who does not become revolutionary o~t
of any conviction but because of some sharp contradictions
developed with his patron, don Monico. He is not
intellectually sound to understand and appreciate any
revolutionary theory or ideals.
The plot of the novel begins with the intrusion of the
federal soldiers to Demetrio's house in El Limon. Just when
an official tries to outrage the modesty of his wife, he
arrives on the scene and expel~ all the soldiers from his
house. Then, Demetrio leaves his wife and little son back
home and leads a band of twenty-five men. They attack the
enemy troops in a narrow steep valley causing extensive
damage to the federal force. Demetrio is also seriously
wounded. He takes shelter along with his men in a small
village in the mountains. He is treated there by Venancio, a
barber, but best educated and most intelligent of Demetrio's
men. Camilla, a village girl serves Demetrio as nurse. He
starts liking the girl but she falls in love with Luis
Cervantes. Cervantes had studied some medicine and had
worked as a journalist. He had heard that Villa would pay to
his men in silver. He, therefore, decided to join the
95
revolutionaries in search of fortune. When he was caught, he
was presented as a prisoner before Demetrio. Cervantes cures
Demetrio's wounded foot and gains his confidence. Some
muleteers tell him that, in Fresnillo, General Panfilo
Natera is planning to attack Huerta's last bastion,
Zacatecas. Cervantes immediately advises Demetrio to allign
himself with the revolutionary forces. They march on leaving
behind camilla in her. village. Increasing his strength on
his way to hundred men, Demetrio Macias meets General
Panfilo Natera in F~esnillo when he was advancing to attack
Zacatecas. Demetrio is made colonel. At this point, Demetrio
recognizes his old acquaintance, captain Solis, under
general Natera' s command. When · Zacatecas is attacked,
Demetrio is promoted as general and the first part of the
novel ends.
The second part of the novel contains events since June
-to October 1914 when the Convenci6n de Aguascalientes was
held. The Revolution has succeeded. Worst excesses are
committed in the plunder. Demetrio does not indulge in that
plunder. Cervantes advises him to go abroad which he does
not accept. Demetrio's brigade reaches Moyahua where the
house of a cacique is set on fire because earlier he had
denounced Demetrio as Maderista. Here, Demetrio remembers
Camilla whose village was not far from Moyahua. He wants
Camilla to be with him. Cervantes is ready to oblige him and
goes to fetch Camilla. He gives her impression that he came
96
to take her along. That is how Cervantes abducts Camilla
taking advantage of her passion for him. Later Pintada kills
camilla out of jealousy. Afterwards, Demetrio Macias
receives order to reach Aguascalientes in order to
participate in the Convention. The second part ends with
their journey in train where they talk about their earnings
in the plunders they had the opportunity to commit.
Luis Cervantes with the fortune he amassed in the loots
goes to the United States and writes from there to Venancio
about his prosperity and also invites him to join him. After
Pancho Villa's defeat in the battle of Celaya_, the tide
turns and in the Demetrio's brigade pessimism creeps in.
They have to move back to the north and the villages earlier
welcomed them now show unconcern. The strength of Demetrio's
men gradually declines and he is barely left with few more
than with which he started his revolutionary activities. one
day he returns to his place, El Limon, where his wife tries
to stop him from going further to continue his fight and
puts a question to him: "Why do you keep on fighting,
Demetrio?" He throws a stone down the valley and answers her
question, "See that stone, how it can not stop .... n36 He
then takes leave of her and continues his march with his few
men. They are at the Canon de Juchipila where two years ago
Demetrio had, for the first time, fought federal troops and
had given them a crushing defeat. They are now ambushed by
36 Azuela, n.21, p. 416.
97
Carranza's troops and whole brigade is destroyed. Demetrio
is also killed: "And at the foot of a crevice as enormous
and sumptuous as the portico of an old cathedral, Demetrio
Macias, with his eyes fixed for ever, keeps aiming with the
barrel of his rifle".37
The uprising springing from centuries of exploitation
offered an opportunity to settle scores with the hacendados,
masters and people in power. That is why poor illiterate
peasantry was in the centre of the game and an illiterate
peasant, Demetrio Macias becomes Azuela's protagonist.
In the 1920s, the government of Mexico was ready to
encourage and publish the realistic, socially oriented
works. it was then that at the end of 1924 Los de abajo came
into limelight. "Evidence of a growth of interest--largely
government-directed, as has been seen--at the end of 1924 in
the problem of a truly national literature, with special
reference to the novel, can be found in the pages of
newspapers and periodicals of the time", 38 comments John
Rutherford. The poet Rafael L6pez had mentioned first time
in an interview with Gregorio Ortega that Los de abajo was
the best Mexican novel and later ortega, under the pen name
Jose Corral Rigan, also claimed the same. However,
37 Ibid. I p. 418.
38 John Rutherford, Mexican Society during the Revolution (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1971), p. 58.
98
participating in a national debate 'Does a modern Mexican
literature exist?', it was Francisco Monterde who in January
1925 centred his arguments mainly on Los de abajo and its
literary qualities. Mariano Azuela was a celebrated author
overnight. El Universal Ilustrado republished Los de abajo
and which was followed by a Madrid edition in 1927 with
Gregorio Ortega's prologue. Mariano Azuela gives full credit
for his success to his friend Ortega: "I don't know what
would have come of all this if Ortega had not taken with him
to Spain thirty copies with which El Universal Ilustrado
paid me". 39 About the events and the characters of Los de
abajo, Azuela clarifies some points:
Most of the events I relate were not witnessed by me: they were constructed, or reconstructed, out o.f various partial visions of people and events. Those who call Los de abajo a report are only revealing their ignorance, if by that they mean that I wrote it in the manner of a chronicler or journalist.... Many events are recounted quite differently from how I witnessed them.40
Pintada was modeled on a girl with some general in the
Juchipila valley. similarly, Gtiero Margarita is a model of a
restaurant, 'Delmonico' of Ciudad Juarez. 41 But Gi.iero is
presented little more complicated giving him some
characteristics of a bad-tempered colonel who worked as an
escort with general Median and used to fire with his pistol
39 Azuela,"El novelista y su ambiente", Obras completas, n.21, p. 1174.
40 Azuela, n. 21, vol. 3, pp. 1082 and 1086.
41 Ibid., pp. 1083-4.
99
on unaware clients in the restaurant or bar. Demetrio Macias
somewhat represents Genral Julian Median who jumps in the
Revolution just to take revenge against his patron, don
Monico: "Before the revolution, I had my land all ploughed,
see, and just right for sowing and if it hadn't been for a
little quarrel with don Monico, the boss of my town,
Moyahua, I'd be there in a jiffy getting the oxen ready for
the sowing, see?"42 ·
This protagonist of Azuela is a poor illiterate peasant
who often fights with the law and order machinery, and who
along with other sufferers of his class gets into the
revolutionary struggle without any clear cut perspective in
mind. It is Luis Cervantes, a city-based intellectual, who
gives Demetrio an idea about the goals of the Revolutioll and
his role to achieve them:
You are a modest man without ambitions, you do not wish to realize the exceedingly important role you are destined to play in the revolution. It is not true that you took up arms simply because of Senor Monico. You are under arms to protest against the evils of all the caciques who are over-running the whole nation. We are the elements of a social movement which will .not rest until it has enlarged the destinies of our motherland. We are the tools Destiny makes use :>f to reclaim the sacred rights of the people. We are not fighting aginst tyranny itself. What moves us it what men call ideals; our action is what men call fighting for a principle. A principle! That's why Villa and Natera and Carranza are fighting; that is why we, every man of us, are fighting.43
42 Ibid., vol. 1, p. 345.
43 Ibid., p. 348.
100
Even after this explanation of the Revolution, the
guerrillas are neither able to comprehend any theory of
revolution nor seem to be interested in doing so. They are
there "for if a man has a rifle in his hands and a belt full
of cartridges, surely he should use them. That means
fighting. Against whom? For whom? That is scarcely a matter
of importance".44
In the beginning they are full of hatred for the
caciques and the federal troops, ·but soon their main goal
becomes collecting of booty. T~e following conversation is
noteworthy in this respect:
It's fun fighting this way", Manteca cried, spicing every other word with an oath. 'You know why the hell you're risking your hide'. In the same hand with which he held the reins, he clutched a shining ornament that he had torn from one of the holy statues.45
After Zacatecas battle, they only once fought a battle.
But they were all indulging in stealing food, drink and
looking for women from the poor as well as the rancheros or
hacendados with sadistic brutality. This even created
hostility and bitterness among the suffering masses.
Demetrio Macias also indulged in immoral acts and did not
make any effort to discipline his followers.
Luis Cervantes, the curro (a Mexical colloquial word
which, with derogatory overtones, is translated as 'young
44 Ibid., p. 407.
45 Ibid., p. 390.
101
gentleman'), pretends to be revolutionary and proves to be
an opportunist. After he wins the confidence of Demetrio, he
becomes his secretary until he leaves his command and to
become more prosperous goes to the United States. Luis
Cervantes represents the intellectual class and takes full
advantage of his position for self gain. he is very clever
and acts smartly as a revolutionary as well as an
opportunist. He is talented -and uses his persuasive
agruments to entice Demetrio Macias:
When the revolution is over, everything is over. Too bad that so many men have been killed, too bad there are so many widows and orphans; too bad there was so much bloodshed. Of course, you are not selfish; you say to yourself: 'All I want to do is go back home'. But I ask you, is it fair to deprive your wife and kids of a fortune which God Himself places within reach of your hand? Is it fair to abandon your motherland in this solemn moment when she most needs the self-sacrifice of her sons, when she most needs her humble sons to save her from falling again in the clutches of her eternal oppressors, executioners, and caciques? You most not forget that the thing a man holds most sacred on earth is his motherland.46
An old acquaintance of Luis Cervantes, Capt. Solis,
meets him when they join General Natera' s command at
Fresnillo. He is surprised to see him fighting on the
revolutionary side
I can't understand how a man who was correspondent of a Government newspaper during the Madero regime, and later editorial writer on a conservative journal, who denounced us as bandits in the most fierry articles, is now fighting on our side.
46 b"d I 1 ., p. 348.
102
I tell you honestly: I have been converted, filled the glasses, they drank.
What about you? Are you tired of the revolution? asked Cervantes sharply.
Tired? My dear fellow, I am twenty-five years old and I'm fit as a fiddle! But am I disappointed? Perhaps! ... I hoped to find a meadow at the end of the road, I found a swamp. Facts are bitter; so are men. That bitterness eats your heart out; it is poison, dry, rot. Enthusiasm, hope, ideals, happiness --vain dreams, vain dreams .... When that is over, you have a choice. Either you turn bandit, like the rest, or the time servers
'11 47 w1 swamp you .....
These two intellectuals reveal enough about the
revolutionary process of Azuela's critical observations. But
it does not mean that Azuela condemned the Revolution. He
never doubted the spirit of the Revolution. What he disliked
and vehemently opposed was the shameless acts of the ·
opportunists that derailed the real revolutionary process.
Basically he was a moralist. He witnessed that, on one hand,
the Revolution fought against injustice, on the other, it
failed to stop the opportunists from entering the
revolutionary forces and contaminating the revolutionary
path. The bitterness of Azuela's facts and fiction was his
concern for the nation. Azuela himself says:
I can be accused of everything except of having distorted truth .... One of the fundamental objectives of most of my novels has been to give a transcription of the medium and the moment which I have lived: that one might find in a couple of hundred pages what he could otherwise get by drowning himself in a sea of printed papers.48
47 Ibid., p. 361.
48 Ibid., vol. 3, p. 1098.
103
Whatever limitations one may find in Los de abajo,
Azuela cannot be rejected for being anti-revolutionary.
Azuela might have had his prejudices and might have failed
in comprehending the dialectics of the Mexican Revolution,
but he had all sympathy for it. The revelation of the
neglected backwater of the Revolution itself is a positive
attitude. Azuela himself was a party to the Revolution and
his passion for it is shown by Valderrrama in the third
chapter of the Los de abajo:
... I love the revolution like a volcano in erruption; I love the volcano because it's a volcano, the revolution because it's the revolution! What do I care about the stones left above or below after the cataclysm? What are they to me?49
Las moscas, Domi tilo quiere ser diputado, and Las
tribulacLones de una familia decente were published in 1918.
Las tribulaciones de una familia decente is the longest and
strongest of all the three novels. The other two are so
short that they barely fall in the category of novels.
After the fall of Huerta, Alvaro Obregon's forces
entered Mexico city but were forced to retreat by the forces
of Pancho Villa and Zapata. However, Villa was subsequently
defeated by Obregon and he had to run towards the north.
This retreat of Villa to the north was given a novelistic
shape by Azuela in Las moscas.
49 Ibid., vol. 1, p. 406.
104
After Villa's defeat in the battle of Celaya, his men
and the moscas (files} are shown to be interested in every
possible event of enjoyment for being associated with Villa
and jump to the other side at the first opportunity. The
first part begins with a station located in the provincial
capital. The second part deals with lively and humorous
scenes of a train journey of Villa's forces. The scenes are
varied, rebellious and harsh. The principal characters are
of the Reyes Tellez family: mother Marta, her children--
librarian Matilde, typist Rosita and Professor Ruben. Ruben
is residing with a Carranza supporter friend in Irapuato to
manage to unite with Obregon. The three ladies follow
Villa's retreat waiting for the final decision. There is
hardly any plot or any protagonist. Different characters
appear and disappear in no time. An ordinary revolutionary--
Malacara, a Porfirian judge--Senor Rios, government
employees, director of school--Neftali, unemployed teachers-
-Raquel and Aurora, a former Porfirian--don Sinforso, and
even flirtatious women--Cachucha and Manuela. Azuela takes
them for flies looking for food. Of course, finally they
have an eye over their employment: "One of them says--we
are defending what is ours, our jobs. Our only party is
food.n50
Neftali Sancho Peredo de la Garza, an anti-
revolutionary from Mexico City, a law student with poetic
50 b'd I 1 • I VO 1. 2 I p. 913 •
105
pre tens ions, be longs to a group of bureaucrats and
represents the intellectual class. He sides with the forces
of Villa and hopes to get employment in the event of their
victory. He is otherwise unconcerned with the Revolution:
"You will know that I live shut away in my ivory tower, that
my spirit soars over mountain peaks with their eternal snows
of serenity, and that it will have nothing to do with all
this wretchedness they call revolution.n51
Las moscas is full of scenic beauty. Azuela in this
novel is close to painting. It may not be a great novel, but
its penetrating satire and brilliant paintings of the events
during the Revolution are superb. However, the novel cannot
be considered as realistic. Azuela also expresses the
feelings of the people thinking of the servitude of the
ordinary employees and functionaries by the new "senores":
"Those of us who had never lived on the payrolls of the
government felt unsurmountable repugnance at that show that
was appearing to us of abjection and misery. n52 Here, one
realizes that Azuela fails to mark a difference clearly
between the small and the powerful. To treat them all as
"moscas" does not justify Azuela's position and rather makes
his case weak.
51 b.d I 1 ., vol. 3, p. 1091.
52 b.d I 1 . , vo 1. 2 , p. 9 4 0.
106
Domitilo quiere ser diputado, which, in fact, is more a
long story than a novel, was also written in 1918. Don
Serapio Alvaradejo, a municipal treasurer of Peron, has
amassed big fortune and wants his son, Domitilo, to be a
ciputado (congressman). A Carrancista general, Xicotencatl
was named after two most important Aztec members, who fought
against Hernari Cortes. Domitilo, therefore, thinks that the
general will help him in becoming a congressman. Don Serapio
invents a way to amass more money by way of asking the rich
people to pay extra taxes in the name of the Carrancista
general. .Don Serapio' s philosophy is "Living is to adapt
oneself to the means.n53 An anonymous letter reaches Serapio
warning him either to reduce the taxes to a one-fourth or
the matter will be reported to the general. Knowing that in
the coming days he along with the general will have to leave
the place, Serapio tries to pacify the rich community and
says: " ... With the business of the poor we will solve the
business problems of the rich. n54 However, the telegram
stating the misdeeds of Serapio reaches the general. On
reading the telegram, the general bursts out laughing and
tells don Serapio who is frozen by terror: " ..• But how
stupid are your compatriots, don Serapio! ... But what would
these terrible fools say if they know that I also served
Huerta and when there was Porfirio, I was a policeman in the
53 b'd I 1 ., p. 937.
54 Ibid.
107
department of public prosecutor .... u55 It clearly shows the
hypocritical radicalism of General Cebollino. The radical
posture he shows is noteworthy:
We who bear the glorious ensign of Constitucionalism are on the point of undertaking the Holy crusade .... We are going to carry out the great work of cleansing Mexico of the leprosy of clericalism. We are astounding our brothers in South America with our portentous work of social renovation; we are asserting ourselves against the insolent Yankee. We shall, yet again, be a guiding light for senile Europe; yet again we shall strike terror into crowned heads. Reactionaries should either be left naked, or strung up from the nearest telegraphy pole, or both •... 56
Don Serapio' s daughter, Antoni ta, who is also less
virtuous like her brother Domitilo, ends the story eloping
with her father's clerk. The caricature of the events is
explained by the novelist himself:
... In these three brief works is reflected all my passion, bitterness and resentment of defeat. It was not only my hard economic condition that afflicted me, but the complete defeat of my Quixotism; the exploitation of the humble class continued as before and only the foremen had changed.57
Las tribulaciones de una familia decente is considered
as the end of the cycle of· the Revolution. The novel is
divided into two parts. This is the story of a hacendado
family of Zacatecas who, after constitucionalistas came into
55 Ibid., p. 948.
56 Ibid., pp. 928 and 936.
57 Ibid., vol. 3, p. 1093.
108
power, fled to Mexico City in June 1914. The hardships of
Vazquez Prado well-to-do landowner family increased after
the fall of the Porfirian regime. They move to the capital
in the hope of maintaining their social status. The mother,
Agustinita, is the dominating figure in the family being the
principal source of the family's wealth. Procopio, the
father, became part of the family by virtue of having got
married to Senora Augstinita. He was educated abroad and had
a different outlook. Perhaps that made him a little
different from the rest of the hacendados. It was reflected
in his human behaviour with the farm labourers and his love
for books. But for Agustinita he is no more than an insecure
henpecked husband. He did not have that ancestoral
background of
looked upon
aristocracy that his wife had. So he was
and often reminded of his poor family
background. He was the administrator in his would be father
in-law's hacienda. He. impressed Senor Prado, his master, so
much that he was allowed to marry his daughter, Augstinita.
He, therefore, tried his best to adopt the aristocratic
ways of life, but he could not integrate himself with it
fully. Perhaps this was the reason that he could realize the
effects of the unavoidable changed circumstances caused by
the Revolution on the Vazquez Prado family.
Lulu and Berta are the two daughters in the family.
Lulu proposed to marry Archibaldo but the aristocracy came
in the way for he was from low background. Berta, a
109
headstrong and ambitious girl, married to Pascual who was
very clever ·and had managed to get a high post in the
Carrancista government. This was a ray of hope for the
entire family. But Pascual's opportunistic tendencies and
hyprocricy did not last long. His downfall virtually brought
the Vazquez Prado family to bankruptcy. The elder son,
Francisco Jose,· hardly has any role in the novel. He aspires
to be a poet of art for art category and takes to aspirins
in any critical situation. The youngest son in the family,
Cesar, narrates the entire story of the family in the first
part of the novel. When they first arrived in the Mexico
city, Cesar's reaction was:.
Where is the gloved hand raised courteously to greet us with affection as we pass? Where is there a single head bared respectfully or humbly bowed on seeing us? Glacial, disdainful, indifferent, insolent faces. That's all. How odious is the metropolis! Here, we are no more than a tiny drop of water in the immensity of the oceans.58
After the ·aristocratic way of life met an untimely
tragic end, the question of survival arose. Procopio,· for
the first time in his life, was no more under the money
power of the Vazquez Prado family. In order to save the
family from starvation, he found a job of a cashier for
himself with a business organization. This was unheard of an
aristocratic family member. So the following comments were
not unexpected:
58 Ibid., vol.1, p.433.
110
Who can any longer doubt that Procopio is set on being the dishonour of our forebears? He is dragging the immaculate name of our house through the mud!
He has descended to the condition of a wage-earner!
And he obliges his family to follow him in such an ignominious fall. I can't do that, I can't: I could sooner die! I hear the voice of the General Prado protesting in their cold tombs.59
When tradition~lism was no longer a way of life for the
distinguished Prado family, its hypocrisy could not be any
assurance of happiness. Las tribulationes de una familia
decente sketches the process of decline of an obstinate
aristocracy and Azuela portrays his revulsion for the same.
Procopio invites Archibaldo, who was earlier humiliated for
not belonging to aristocracy, and gives him his daughter
Lulu's hand. That is how Procopio, his daughter Lulu and her
erstwhile suitor, Archibaldo, overcome the difficult
situation of the family and start living a new lease of life
with dignity of labour.
After Revolution
Although by the end of 1918, Azuela had published ten
novels and novelettes, he was hardly known to large number
of readers. Principally, it was the moral obligation of the
critics to bring Azuela's creative world in the open in
which they miserably failed. Naturally, it was a great
59 Ibid., p. 556.
111
discouragement for the writer. Perhaps that was the reason
Mariano Azuela could not give a new novel until 1923. Walter
M. Langford clearly puts blame on the critics for their lack
of vision:
In their eyes his revolutionary theme and style represented a disturbing departure from the comfortable norm they had known and cultivated. They felt threatened by this new novelist and since they did not have Azuela's vision, nor had they shared his involvement in the epochal events of the Revolution, they completely ignored him.60
Realizing that he was not being recognized by the
critics, Azuela switched over to the European cubist style
and published three novels: La Malhora (1923), El desquite
(1925) and La luciernaga (written in 1927, but fully
published for the first time in 1932).
La malhora is a story of a fifteen years old prostitute
called Altagracia. This was also the story of the people of
Tepito living in utter poverty and who used to take to
pulque in order to try to forget their miseries. In fact,
the writer himself lived in Tepito and observed the people's
life through his creative eyes. Altagracia trying to take
revenge ·of her father's assassination gets injured. In the
hospital, she happens to know a doctorYs wife who takes her
in her charge: Al tagracia goes to doctor's house who is
neurotic and believer of theosophy. By receiving good
60 Walter M. Langford, The Mexican Novel Comes of Age, (Notre Dame, University of Notre Dame Press, 1972), p.26.
112
treatment and by getting impressed by the theosophical
doctrine of general forgiveness, she believes to have been
salvaged. She then goes to the service of Las Gutierro --the
three devout ladies--who had reached Mexico City from
Irapuato after they had lost there everything during the
Revolution. They used to make their living by stiching
dresses. Altagracia is impressed so much by their devotion
that she also starts participating in their religious
activities. Everything went on smoothly for five years, but
then, on a Sunday, in front of the Church, Altagracia met
with her old prostitute enemy, Tapatia, and had a quarrel
with her in full public view. The three old ladies left her
on the street, and Altagracia was again left to return to
her old way. However, she tried to 1 i ve with honour and
found a job of a maidservant in the house of a Porfirian
general. But the ambiguity of her life forced her to take to
alchol. After a month, for her indecent behaviour, she was
chucked out of the house. She was left with no option than
to go for her old profession. Burning with anger to take
revenge on Tapatia and her lover Marcelo, she attacked them
to kill. But with first blow when she saw Tapatia's false
teeth falling down, she left the idea of stabbing her and
gave her a rosary to pray for her life.
After general's house, when Altagracia is shown second
time in the hospital, the doctors tell her that she is not
bodily ill: "Your ailment is concerned with the industries,
113
and not with the medical science, bred without salary. n61
Azuela drives his point home by suggesting that social evils
cannot be cured by medicines. Since the writer himself was a
doctor, he knew the weaknesses of the profession very well
and thus utilised the opportunity to criticise the unethical
doctors, not devoted to their profession: "These doctors--
tells one of the nurses of the hospital--the only thing they
know well is to make love to us.n62
Walter M. Langford rightly states about Azuela's this
creative work:
It is one of the earliest of the Mexican novels to depict with stark realism and shattering pessimism the subhuman existence of degraded individuals in the poorest part of Mexico City ..•. Here, there is generous use of confused and unexpected images, elliptical sentences, tricky metaphors, single word expected to do the work of many. Yet the author's most significant innovation lies in his enterinJ! the subconscious thoughts of one of his characters. 3
This new literary style was later perfected by Agustin
Yanez in his most celebrated novel, A1 filo del agua and by
Carlos Fuentes in La region mas transparente. The end of the
novel remained a puzzle for the critics as well as for the
readers as it was not clear whether Altagracia killed her
enemies--Tapatia and her lover Marcelo. Some of the critics
61 Azuela, n. 21, vol. 2, p. 974.
62 Ibid., p. 976.
63 Langford, n. 60, p. 27.
114
even interpreted the end by concluding that they were killed
by La malhora. However, this mystery was later clarified by
the author himself. La malhora "saw clearly the true
situation of her enemies, now old and beaten down by life,
and she forgave them with the most profound contempt. She
did not kill either la Tapatia or Marcelo. Her vengeance was
in scorning them."64
El desquite, published in 1925, used a modern narrative
style. It is indirectly narrated by a doctor who interviewed
various p.ersons, and their versions finally took .a
novelistic shape. Here also, like in Sin amor, Lupe was
married by her mother, Lenita, out of greed to a rich man,
Blas, nicknamed as Huachichile that denotes indigenous
ascendency. His father was once a muleteer and who succeeded
in building his high status. Lupe then broke with her lover,
Martin, and married unwillingly to Blas. And, as a
consequence, they always remained on bad terms and without
any son or daughter. Blas then adopted a child of one of his
relations. Child Ricardo, after some years, becomes a grown
up young man and conceives an idea of descrediting Lupe and
inherit the entire property of Blas. With this objective in
mind, he plans to seduce his adopted mother in a garden
after fixing there some witnesses. As this plan of Ricardo
fails, he sends some anonymous letters to Blas accusing Lupe
64 Azuela, quoted in Bernard M. Dulsey, "Azuela Revisited" 1 Hispania 1 vol. 35, 1952, p. 332.
115
of having illicit relation with the writer of the letters.
Lupe is a dominating type of lady. When Blas asks her about
her illicit relations as per those anonymous let:_ers, she
convinces him of her innocence. Both of them then go the
their ranch where after few weeks Blas dies. Blas, in fact,
became alcoholic that Lupe encouraged. After Blas' s death,
the rumour goes around that Lupe poisoned him. Lupe's old
lover Martin comes to defend her case and manages to get her
acquitted of the blame. Martin married his old lover Lupe,
but could not succeed in getting her rid of her guilty
conscience. Lupe suffers from the hallucination. Lupe sees
Blas's two eyes following her all the time which she cannot
resist and goes mad.
In this novel, Azuela attempted to use new narrative
style. Azuela seems to be influenced by the modern European
literary currents. But Azuela's narrative originality
developed in his earlier novels does appear at many places
in the novel. For example, the description of a train
journey in which the youth days of Martin and Lupe are
shown. The surrealistic style is reflected in the events.
But the novel cannot be considered as one of the major works
of Azuela. He is not able to build up the sensational terror
that Lupe should have experienced on seeing Blas' s
persecuting eyes. One does not really know why Ricardito
has not been questioned for Blas's death. There are many
other questions that remain unanswered and that make this
116
novel weak. Whether Blas retaliates (desquite) for Lupe
could not give him a child or for having been poisioned is
difficult to say. Azuela tries to harmonize the modernist
style with his narrative technique. Except for some changes
here and there, the theme has already been dealt by Azuela
in his earlier novels.
Walter M. Langford remarks that " ... La luciernaga ranks
high among his total output. In fact, it probably stands,
along with Los de abajo and Las tribulaciones de una familia
decente, as one of Azuela's three best works.n65 Similarly,
Luis Leal says: "Without any doubt, La luciernaga is, after
Los de abajo, the best novel of Azuela. "66 In this case,
action does not simply pass from a village to capital or
from capital to a village, but from central character
Dionisio's heart to his brother Jose Maria's heart.
Although Azuela had been 'discovered' for his great
contribution to the Mexican literature by april 1925, it was
only in 1932 that La luciernaga was published in Spain. Luis
Leal, however, claims that this novel was written around·
1926.67 It is, therefore. a gap of seven years between the
publication of El desquite in 1925 and that cf La luciernaqa
in 1932 that speaks about Azuela's discontent with the
65 Langford, n. 60, p. 28.
66 Leal, n. 10, p. 61.
67 Ib'd 57 1 • , p. .
117
Mexican literary critics. When La luciernaga appeared in
1932, Azuela had already reached the peak of his popularity,
but he was awarded the Premio Nacional de Literatura only in
1949 when he was seventy-six. It is quite unfortunate that
many lesser important writers had already been awarded this
prize much earlier.
La luciernaga is divided into four parts. It is a sad
story of a Mexican family that abandons its native town
Cieneguilla during the Revolution and goes to the capital
for more comforts and better education to its children. The
family gradually loses its money and the head of the family,
Dionisio, becomes alcoholic. Azuela knits al"l these events
in the process of Mexico's so-called socio-political
development that were, in fact, undoing the course of the
Revolution. The first two parts of the novel deal with
repercussions of the Revolution whereas the remaining two
parts describe the first few years of the Plutarco Elias
Calles's regime. Calles has assumed presidency in December
1924. La luciernaga is a social account of this period and
critically illustrates the changing social environment of
the capital as well as of the countryside. It is noteworthy
here that Azuela's return to the Mexican society's burning
problems is seen after he was well recognized for his
literary genius and Los de abajo was talk of the town.
118
Don Bartolo, a well to do man of Cieneguilla leaves
behind a fortune for his two sons-- Jose Maria and Dionisio.
On the advice of shrewd Jose Maria, the division of don
Bartolo's property is made in such a way that Dionisio is
given fifteen thousand pesos in cash and rest of the
property is retained by Jose Maria . Dionisio thought that
that much money would be sufficient for him to start a
business. He, therefore, goes to the capital with his wife,
Conchita, and four children. His plans of making lot of
money in the capital and giving good education to his
children which was not possible in a small town proved to be
wrong. What he did not know was that the trustworthy and
secure atmosphere of the interior was not to be seen
anywhere in the capital and that there everybody was waiting
to get rich on the expenses of others. His fifteen thousand
pesos were good enough to attract hotel and restaurant
owners to present him hefty bills. The same way he was quite
an attraction for his compatriots who were ever ready to
'help' him in his new venture. So he fell p:ey to all these
city slickers and was soon penniless. Dionisio not only
became weak economically, he had also become weak physically
and morally. Whatever money was left with him, he bought a
second-hand bus. Under the influence of alcohol, he hit with
his bus a tram with full of passengers killing some of them.
He escapes unhurt and unnoticed but he was completely
destroyed. Dionisio's family got to know about the accident
119
when the report of the accident was published in the
newspapers. With this accident scene unfolds the story of La
luc_iernaga. The reader gradually comes to know that Dionisio
was fed up of miserable life and, in order to get rid of it,
he had deliberately hit his bus with the tram. As he could
not kill himself in that accident, he was more sad and felt
guilty of the crime. The real theme is of Dionisio's
"total eclipse of his intelligence and will power"68 and the
growing misery of his family.
Dionisio is introduced to narcotic business and
gradually he gets involved in the underworld. The whole
family now starts living on his daughter, Maria Cristina's
earnings as a prostitute. In Cieneguilla, Jose Maria
receives one letter from Dionisio seeking his financial
help. Then he receives a telegram threatening to commit
suicide if no help is received. Jose Maria just ignores
them, but on reading in a newspaper about the assassination
of Maria Cristina in a wild night of orgy, he legates to his
brother 2578.12 pesos that he had swindled of him. Jose
Maria also dies of tuberculosis. He had survived the ups and
downs of the Revolution and had managed to become rich. With
the money inherited from his brother Jose Maria, Dionisio
opens a shop. But he had to close his shop as the corrupt
inspectors of the Calles regime either fined him or
68 Azuela, n. 21, vol. 1, p. 594.
120
confiscated things from his shop in
this rule or that rule. They even
the garb of violating
fined Dionisio for
keeping a petrol can in the shop just to contain water in
it. They argued that the presence of can was sufficient
proof for illegal sale of petrol.
This was a sad commentary that Azuela made on the
corrupt government of Calles. During that incident, Dionisio
happens to meet La Genrala, who suggests him to open a
Pulqueria (pulque bar). He agrees to it and makes investment
in a cheap tavern called La Noche Buena. La Generala takes
charge of the bar as authorities do not come to trouble her.
The business picks up, but La Generlas very cleverly
introduces Dionisio to some underworld figures. Dionisio no
more remains master of his acts. The circumstances create a
distance between him and his family. He is no more capable
of taking care of his family . His son, Sebastian, becomes
seriously ill and the boy dies. Conchita could not resist
this situation any more. She was completely shaken and
could not depend on Dionisio any.more for the upbringing of
l)er remaining two children. In order to save her two
children from the physical and moral dangers in the. capital,
Conchite quietly leaves for Cieneguilla without even
informing Dionisio. During the same year, on the Christmas
day, his partner La Generala opens the cash box and flees
carrying all the money. This was the last blow on Dionisio
121 77-1-4 89~
as he was left to his miseries all alone with no family and
no friends around.
The last part of the novel begins with Conchita in
cieneguilla somehow able to work and maintain her family.
She sends her two children to study in the Catholic school.
This is also the period of fanatic agitations. It helps
Conchita to restore her normal life as fanatics take her as
their ally in the fight against the government's anti-
religious policies. But Conchita finds herself neither side.
She had fled from a system that forced her teen- aged
daughter to take to prostitution and who was ultimately
assassinated. She had also lost her adolscent son who had
also got mixed with a band of misled boys of the capital.
She would not lose her two children any more even at the
cost of her own life. For Azuela Conchita represents the
best in Mexican motherhood. Conchita is undoubtedly the
strongest female character in all the novels of Azuela. The
message that Azuela conveys through La luciernaga is the
character of Conchita:
She is not just a mother; a mother can be a she wolf, a hyena, a snake. She is the Christian wife who follows her companion, even if he is beset by sickness, by misery, by vice, or by crime itself. If the mission of the firefly is to make the night blacker with its tiny light, the firefly, by twinkling, fulfils its mission.69
Conchita comes to know through the newspaper that
Dionisio has been gravely injured while committing some
69 Azuela, n. 21, p. 663.
122
crime. She cannot resist herself and decides to go to see
Dionisio • She sells her things to buy tickets for reaching
Mexico City. They meet each other when Dionisio comes out of
the hospital. Dionisio ends the story by saying, "I had a
hunch ·you would have to come back.n70
Azuela was deeply disturbed by the deteriorating social
values even after the Revolution. The degrading human values
make the writer to comment: "Here honesty to the whole world
is quoted in hard cash. n71 Azuela takes up without any
hinderance the cause of the common people. the underdogs who
were living the same sub- human·life that they lived under
the Spanish colonial rule and during the porfirian regime.
He, therefore, decides to attack all sorts of corruption,
opportunism and anti-people bureaucratic structure that were
out to undermine the gains of the Revolution. In fact, it
would not be exaggerating Azuela if it is said that he gave
the Mexican novel a sense of purpose and a new direction.
Only Agustin Yanez and Carlos Fuentes can be considered at
par with Mariano Azuela as far. as the question of Mexican
novel is concerned. Azuela' s greatness was to make the
uprooted, the downtrodden and the exploited peon th~ central
character of his creative world and the topic of discussion
at all intellectual fora. It is this factor that brought the
national question to the focus.
/0 b'd I 1 . , p. 667.
71 Ibid., p. 580.
123
The point of take off for Azuela's literary works was
the criticism of then existing social panorama and
circumstances that were injust, absurd, and devoid of human
values and national consciousness. Reforma's slogans of
truth, liberty, justice and progress that were the outcome
of liberal rationalism and that demanded to break with the
feudal past being protected by the Latifundistas and the
Church, had deep influence on Azuela's creativity. Azuela's
liberalism was impregnated with humanitarianism that was
against man's exploitation by man. That is why while
defending the liberal ideology, he could not support the
economic goals of the force aspiring to achieve capitalistic
exploitation. Azuela was not only demanding authentic and
socially conscious art and literature but also national
identity and pride even to his Los de abajo.
124
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