The Mexican's Opinion of Revolution As Expressed in the Mexican Novel Since 1910
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The Mexican's opinion of revolution as expressed in the Mexican novel since 1910 Item Type text; Thesis-Reproduction (electronic) Authors Henry, Elizabeth McClaughry Publisher The University of Arizona. Rights Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author. Download date 26/09/2021 13:43:43 Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/553132 THE MEXICAN’S OPINION OF REVOLUTION AS EXPRESSED IN THE MEXICAN NOVEL SINCE 1910 by Elizabeth M. Henry Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts ; -';y. :-;v, in the College of Letters, Arts, and Soienoea, of the University of Arizona 1 9 5 3 £ 979/ 7932. J>2. aoknowledgmeht Grateful acknowledgment is made to Mr# George R. Nichols, under whose direction this thesis was written, for his interest and advice, and to Setior Julio Jimenez Rueda, of the National University of Mexico, for helpful suggestions in regard to sources of material# E, M. H. 85749 PREFACE A stormy career, Mexico's. What do the Mexicans themselves think of their strange nation al turbulence? What do they consider responsible for it? What do they believe it has accomplished? Do they feel that revolution is a deterrent or an accel erant to the progress of their civilization? In their opinion, what, if not armed rebellion, holds the solu tion to the problems of the nation? Into their at titude toward revolution as it is expressed by their own representatives, the Mexican novelists who have been writing since 1910— since the beginning of the most violent revolutionary era, it shall be our pur pose to inquire. TABLE OF CONTENTS Preface I. Introduction: Outline of Mexico’s Revolutionary History ........ .. • . 1 II. Attitude toward the Revolution of 1910 • . 5 III. Attitude toward Revolution In General . 51 IT. Solution to Mexico's Problems ...... 67 7. Conclusions....................... 83 Notes .................... ............. 86 Bibliography........ .. ........... 98 THE MEXICAN'S OPINION OF REVOLUTION AS EXPRESSED IN THE !5mO A N NOVEL SINGE 1810 I. Introductioni Outline of I'ezioo'o Revolutionary History Perhaps tho nost striking fact of Mex ico's history Is the frequency of her revolutionse There was, first of all, the rebellion against Spain, beginning in 1810 and ending with the independence of Mexico in 1821 — this War of Independence, however, quite different in nature and purpose from the other merely civil wars which followed it# During the next hundred and eight years— of which thirty-three may be discounted as years of enforced peace under the Diaz regime— there have been at least six teen definite movements of revolt, eight of them, since 1909. Some have been popular uprisings, others more political or military coups. But whatever their origin and aim, history records the following: In 1822, shortly after the Independence, Iturbid# was proclaimed Emperor of the new Mexican nation. Almost immediately Santa Anna rose against him, and he was forced to abdicate In 1823. A revolt began in 1830 against 2 Guerrero, president at that time; a oounter-revolution in his favor ended with his death in February, 1831, Another rebellion followed the assumption of the presidency by Bustamante. In 1835 came the revolt of Texas (annexed to the United States in 1848)— again, a movement falling in a rather different category. But in 1854 Mexico was back at the old game, with the Revolution of Ayutla, during the administration of Juan Alvarez. Soon afterward, Coraonfort, who succeeded Alvarez in 1856, had another revolt to com bat. In 1857 came an uprising under Zulnaga, followed by the great revolution under Benito Juirez, which lasted from 1858 to 1861. The next few years were free from oivil war, but apparently only because of the necessity of unified action on the part of the Mexicans to repel foreign invaders. Then on January 15, 1876, revolution broke forth again, con suming the government of JuArez and, in 1877, installing Porfirio Diaz in the presidential chair, which he occupied, 2 with but one interruption, until May 25, 1911. During most of his long reign, the Dic tator suppressed with an iron hand any attempt at revolt. But in 1910 his failing strength oould no longer dominate a seething nation, and a widespread revolution, with Fran cisco Madero as its leader, forced him in 1911 to relin quish the presidency. In 1912 Pasoual Orozco and then F&llz 3- Diaz rebelled against Madero, renewing the oonfliot* which continued even after Huerta, commander-in-chief of the Federal army, became president» upon the murder of Madero in 1913; for Carranza immediately inaugurated a revolution against him. Huerta resigned JUly 15, 1914. One pro visional president followed another, and the revolution went on, conducted principally by Pancho Villa, even after a crushing defeat inflicted upon the latter by ObregSn in 1915. 1 Venustiano Carranza was elected pres ident of Mexico in 1917. In 1919 Villa was in action against him, and continued to give the Government trouble until he laid down his arms in 1921. In 1920, a revolt in favor of Obregdn broke out in Sonora, and soon spread over the country. Carranza left Mexico City Why 7, and was subsequently mur dered. Adolfo de la Huerta became provisional president until November, 1920, when Obreg^n was made chief execu tive. December, 1923, saw a revolt in behalf of De la Huerta, then Cooperatist candidate for the presidency, which was crushed, however, in a few months. Calles, the Agrarian candidate and Obregdn’s choice, was elected. In October, 1927, a revolution under Francisco Serrano and Arnulfo G&aez, No-reeleotionist candidates, was quickly 4- and finally put down when both leaders were captured and shot* Obregdn, who was reelected July 1, 1988, was assassinated shortly after, and Fortes Oil took office when Dalles1 term as provisional president expired, on November 30. A revolt against his government, in March, 3 1929, was suppressed by Dalles. Ortiz Rubio became president of Mexico in February, 1930, and there have been no further revol utions to the present time (April, 1938)* II. ATTITUDE TOWARD THE REVOLUTION OF 1910 We shall first eonsider the Revolution of 1910 as it appears to the Mexican: whether or not it was necessary, what was expected of it, wherein it succeed ed or failed, and why. Later we shall examine his attitude toward revolution in general. The verdict is almost unanimous that in 1910 a change was necessary. The power was in the hands of a few, and conditions for most of the population were dis tressing. Of course it was the poor who suffered most, and this was true particularly on the large estates, whose wealthy owners, according to the majority of the novelists, used the peons with cruelty and injustice. Denied posses sion of the land they worked, forced to toll from dawn to dark for a miserable wage, kept in a state of hopeless in debtedness to the landlord, compelled to buy all their sup- 4 plies at the tiendas de raya. where "the workers are ob- 5 liged to pay for the goods the price that the owners wish," and where "they were forced to receive their wages in the 6 form of rotten cereals, of mantas and calico, of deter- 7 8 9 iorated huaraphes and sombreros 1huiohole®1," subject to the merest whim of the landlord, who had over them virtual 6 power of life and death, and from whom they bad m appeal, the peons found their lot indeed a wretched one. That is why Herrera Friaont mentions "the brutal life which was forced upon the countrymen there in his land (yera Orussl" and G&mez Palaoio says, of Mexico in general, "On ranches and haciendas they are reduced to living almost like beasts, without intellectual nourishment, without moral stimulus, 11 without social benefits." On the estates, "Poverty moaned at the door of organized wealth." Ascension Reyes sums up the financial abuse of the laborers when he tells of "the 111 treatment they receive from their master#, how the latter rob them in different ways, paying them a miserable wage in the first place, then with the tiendas de rava. and finally, collecting a hundred per cent on what they at times lend them. .Is there any baelends in the country on which the workers are paid more than eighteen to twenty-five cents, for work that lasts from dawn to dark, exhausting work, with out hope of improving ever; where.the workers are not ex- 13 plaited with the tiendas de rava?" ‘1ir'.r:“.^." .,n . In Mala Yerba, one of his pre-revolution ary- novels, Mariano Azuela presents another aspect of the peon’s plight: the helplessness of the women against what amounted to the droit du seigneur of the landlord, and the futility of any attempt on the part of their men to defend -7 them. In Fttertee y debiles, L^pea Portillo y Rojas— al though he says that conditions at the tine were not so bad 14 as was generally believed — paints a convincing picture of the impotence of the countrymen on the hacienda de San Yltor against the cruelty and the lust of the degenerate Don Oheno• • ' Ltiguel Area's resume of general con ditions on the great estates is perhaps the most forceful noted. He says: *nve have left the Indians who work our fields and raise our crops in the same state in which we received them at the time of the Independence, filled with fanaticism, unable to read, insufficiently nourished, work ing from dawn to dark for a wage which does not yield enough for them to live on, hafrassed, beaten, still call ing us 'Rente de razin' as if they admitted having no in tellect themselves, as the encomenderos affirmed: slaves to the managers of the haciendas, exploited through the tiendas de raya.