Hugo Brehme created an idyllic vision of Mexico that influenced photography, film, and literature for a hundred years. His beautifully composed, timeless images of lo mexicano—cacti and pyramids, Indian children and marketplaces, colonial buildings and snow-capped volcanoes and peaks—were widely distributed and acclaimed both in Mexico and internationally. Noted critic Olivier Debroise characterized Brehme as "both the first modern photographer of Mexico and the last representative of its old guard and of a certain nineteenth-century vision." Working in Mexico from 1905 until his death in 1954, he was an early mentor to Mexico's most famous photographer, Manuel álvarez Bravo, and a significant influence on Golden Age filmmakers Gabriel Figueroa and Emilio "El Indio" Fernández. Brehme-esque imagery even appears in the work of American filmmaker John Ford and Russian filmmaker Sergei Eisenstein. Timeless Mexico presents an outstanding selection of Hugo Brehme's photographs, ranging from imagery of the Mexican Revolution to scenic landscapes, colonial architecture, and the everyday life of indigenous peoples. Susan Toomey Frost, who has collected Brehme's photography for many years, provides an illuminating introduction to his life and work. She also describes his practice of printing and distributing his photographs as collectible postcards—a practice that, together with publication in countless books, magazines, and tourist brochures, gave Brehme's work the wide circulation that made his images of Mexico iconic. Art historian Stella de Sá Rego authoritatively discusses Brehme's place in the history of Mexican photography, especially within Pictorialism, as she reveals how a man from Eisenach, Germany, came to create an enduring visual mythology of the essence of Mexico.

In this groundbreaking study of Mexican public opinion and elections, Jorge Dominguez and James McCann examine the attitudes and behaviors of Mexican voters from the 1950s to the 1990s and find evidence of both support for and increasing independence from the nation's ruling party. They make extensive use of polls conducted during the 1988, 1991, and 1994 national elections and draw from in-depth interviews with leading political figures, including major presidential candidates. Although the 1994 presidential election showed that Mexican citizens are making their opinions known and felt at the polls, Dominguez and McCann argue that Mexico cannot be considered a democracy as long as party elites fail to ensure truly free and fair elections. Democratizing Mexico makes it clear, however, that Mexican citizens are ready for democratic politics.

Brave Aztec warriors, artistic Tarascans, fleet endurance runners of the Tarahumaras -- readers won't want to miss these and other intriguing legends that bring ancient Mexico to life. Award-winning artist Tomie de Paola enriches these folk histories with vibrant illustrations. A glossary, notes, and a pronunciation guide round out this entertaining and enduring collection of legends.

Based on extensive research as well as on a career working for cultural institutions, historian Thomas E. Chávez has created a historical novel about the American southwest, specifically in New Mexico and Arizona, a place where Europeans settled in 1598. Here is a historical narrative about one of those families. The story begins and ends with Edward Romero who became the United States ambassador to Spain and is prototypical of the thousands of young men and some women who sought a new life in the new world and became American. These were people taking risks, accepting fate, succeeding, failing, loving, and hating. The Romero story is an American odyssey shared by any number of families in a region and whose cultural legacy is part of the heritage of the United States that only recently has come to the fore in the United States’ national consciousness. This story delineates a part of the heritage of every American and enriches an already beautiful history. A bibliographic essay, maps, and genealogical charts will assist the reader to differentiate places, names, and generations.

The classic memoir of the Nobel Prize–winning poet, now expanded with newly discovered material Southern Chile was an open frontier when the beloved poet Pablo Neruda was born there in 1904. A motherless, pensive child in the wild, he began writing poems long before quitting the countryside for Santiago, where he spent his bohemian student years. From there, his memoir follows his travels as a globetrotting Chilean consul—including a stint in Spain during its civil war, and in Mexico, where he attracted attention for aiding a man suspected of conspiring to assassinate Leon Trotsky—and his short-lived service as a Chilean senator. Neruda, a communist, was driven from his senate seat in 1948, and a warrant was issued for his arrest. After a year in hiding, he escaped on horseback over the Andes, then to Europe and Asia. The memoirs conclude shortly after the coup in 1972 that overthrew his close friend Salvador Allende, Chile’s first democratically elected president, as Neruda himself battled cancer. Now expanded to include newly discovered material, The Complete Memoirs is the definitive edition of Neruda’s classic memoir—a moving, revealing record of his life as a poet, a patriot, and one of the twentieth century’s true men of conscience.