In other words, it is the very features that make a literary text a classic where a translator encounters the toughest challenges to translating it. It may very well reside in that text’s translatability, in the obstacles and challenges to the translation itself, the most prominent of which in The Underdogs I have described here. It may also reside in the fact that a defining characteristic of a classic seems to be that it is translated repeatedly through time, as if each new generation required its own new version of that classic, or as if the work itself were constantly calling out for translation. Thus, translation can be said to contribute to the making of a classic— not only by exporting the work into other languages and traditions and by assuring that text’s “afterlife,” as Walter Benjamin might say, but also by underscoring many of the most fascinating elements of the text, which almost inevitably arise as challenges to the craft of translation. These, then, are some of the central elements that make The Underdogs a classic of Mexican—and Latin American—literature. What follows is my attempt to re-create this classic in a new version in English.

—SERGIO WAISMAN

Suggestions for Further Reading

Azuela, Mariano. Los de abajo: Novela de la Revolucion Mexicana. Edited with an Introduction, Notes, and Vocabulary by John E. Englekirk. New York, London: Appleton-Century -Crofts, 1939.

Benjamin, Walter. “The Task of the Translator.” In Theories of Translation: An Anthology of Essays from Dryden to Derrida, edited by Rainer Schulte and John Biguenet, 71-82. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992.

Brenner, Anita. The Wind That Swept Mexico: The History of the Mexican Revolution of 1910-1942. With 184 photographs assembled by George R. Leighton. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2003.

Campobello, Nellie. Cartucho; and My mother’s hands. Translated by Doris Meyer and Irene Matthews. Introduction by Elena Poniatowska. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1988.

Fuentes, Carlos. La nueva novela hispanoamericana. México: J. Mortiz, 1969.

Gonzales, Michael J. The Mexican Revolution 1910-1940. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2002.

Guzmán, Martín Luis. The Eagle and the Serpent. Translated by Harriet de Onis. With an Introduction by Federico de Onis. Garden City, NY: Dolphin Books, 1965.

Hernández Chávez, Alicia. Translated by Andy Klatt. Mexico: A Brief History. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006.

Knight, Alan. The Mexican Revolution. 2 vols. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986.

Krauze, Enrique. Mexico, Biography of Power: A History of Modern Mexico, 1810-1996. Translated by Hank Heifetz. New York: HarperCollins, 1997.

Leal, Luis. Mariano Azuela. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1971.

MacLachlan, Colin M., and William H. Beezley. El gran pueblo: A History of Greater Mexico. 2nd ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Simon & Schuster, 1999.

Robe, Stanley L. Azuela and the Mexican Underdogs. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1979.

Chronology of the Mexican Revolution

1876-80; 1884-1911: Authoritarian rule of Porfirio Díaz, a period known as the Porfiriato. Although Díaz remains in power through presidential elections, he runs unopposed in repeatedly rigged elections, in essence reelecting himself seven times. Díaz undertakes a number of important modernization and liberalization projects in Mexico, but these almost exclusively benefit only the upper classes and the wealthy landowners, creating an ever-increasing gap between rich and poor, between the upper and lower classes, and between cities and rural areas.

November 20, 1910: Francisco Madero issues the Plan de San Luis Potosí, declaring Díaz’s regime illegal and calling for a revolution against him. Uprisings erupt primarily in the northern and the southern states of the country.

April-May, 1911: Battle of Ciudad Juárez, in which Pascual Orozco and Francisco “Pancho” Villa defeat the Federale army. Crucial to Madero’s overthrow of the Díaz regime.

1911: Díaz goes into exile on May 25. Madero—promising agrarian and land reforms—is elected as the new president with the support of popular leaders such as Villa (from the north) and Emiliano Zapata (from the south), and with an overwhelming majority.

1911-13: Madero’s presidency, which had begun as a united effort against Díaz and the Porfiriato, quickly weakens. Madero’s refusal to enact agrarian and land reforms causes leaders such as Villa and Zapata to turn against him.

February 9-22, 1913: Victoriano Huerta stages a military coup against Madero in a series of events known as La decena trágica (the tragic ten days), which culminate with Madero and his vice president, Pino Suárez, being murdered, and with Huerta taking over as president and establishing a new dictatorship.

Late February 1913: Villa, Zapata, Venustiano Carranza (an early supporter of Madero’s efforts to overthrow Díaz), and Álvaro Obregón (who had also contributed in the overthrow of Díaz) join in resistance against Huerta’s dictatorship, as they begin fighting against Huerta’s army.

October 2, 1913: Villa’s Northern Division captures Torreón (in the state of Coahuila).