Survivors in Mexico

by Rebecca West, Bernard Schweizer (Editor)

The publication of Rebecca West's Survivors in Mexico marks an important literary the rescue from oblivion of a daring and important work by an major twentieth-century writer. This book is West's exploration of Mexican history, religion, and culture - a work the author clearly conceived as a companion and sequel to her masterpiece about the Balkans, Black Lamb and Grey Falcon (1941). Although West never brought Survivors to completion, she left behind a series of extensive drafts and revisions that Bernard Schweizer has meticulously assembled and edited. The result is a welcome addition to the Rebecca West canon - a compelling travel memoir/history comparable to her best work, and one certain to gain readers and critical acclaim.

Genres: History, Travel, Nonfiction, Essays, Female Authors, Memoir

304 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2003

About the author

Cicely Isabel Fairfield, known by her pen name Rebecca West, or Dame Rebecca West, DBE was an English author, journalist, literary critic, and travel writer. She was brought up in Edinburgh, Scotland, where she attended George Watson's Ladies College.

A prolific, protean author who wrote in many genres, West was committed to feminist and liberal principles and was one of the foremost public intellectuals of the twentieth century. She reviewed books for The Times, the New York Herald Tribune, the Sunday Telegraph, and the New Republic, and she was a correspondent for The Bookman. Her major works include Black Lamb and Grey Falcon (1941), on the history and culture of Yugoslavia; A Train of Powder (1955), her coverage of the Nuremberg trials, published originally in The New Yorker; The Meaning of Treason, later The New Meaning of Treason, a study of World War II and Communist traitors; The Return of the Soldier, a modernist World War I novel; and the "Aubrey trilogy" of autobiographical novels, The Fountain Overflows, This Real Night, and Cousin Rosamund. Time called her "indisputably the world's number one woman writer" in 1947. She was made CBE in 1949, and DBE in 1959, in recognition of her outstanding contributions to British letters.

Reviews

[John Ratliffe · Rating 4 out of 5]

When Dame Rebecca West, DBE, nee Dame Cicily Isabel Fairfield, writes a travelog it inevitably becomes a wide ranging foray into culture, history, art, language, and personalities. In this case she writes of those who "survived," and of those who did not survive, in the tumultuous evolution of New Spain, now Mexico, and among them those who formed the culture of Mexico, as it stands now. I wish I could do justice to the brilliance of her exploration and exposition. Perhaps I will try to add to these comments at a later time.

In reading this book I run up against the usual question: how does an author come into possession of so much detailed knowledge of a subject? She must have surveyed just about every word that has ever been written about the conquest of Mexico, and destruction of Aztec civilization, and/or researched original documents held in libraries anywhere and everywhere. And to this she adds her seemingly boundless knowledge of world history, language, and art. And of course, her fame as a writer commands the very best sources for interviews.

I am flabbergasted by her exquisite descriptions of the Aztecs, including all aspects of the "Indian" culture and history in Mesoamerica, and of the personalities involved, including those on the Spanish side. After reaching a new understanding of how advanced and interesting the Aztecs were, I feel like pursuing that subject further, as many already have. I had no idea this history was so well documented by the Spanish and subsequent writers. And I hasten to add it is just not Mexico on the pages, but interesting and witty toss-ins from from a true polymath. This I envy mightily. The book is extensively footnoted as well.

West died in 1983 before she could finish this book, which was published in 2003. The final chapters were cobbled together by her editor (he writes a long introduction to explain) rather well from scraps, notes, and drafts, but the ending does not have the quality of the rest of the book, understandably so. West, as the reader may know, is one of the most beloved British writers, and my introduction to her was through her "Black Lamb and Grey Falcon," a travel writing covering the entirety of the Balkans pre-World War II. That reading is still in process, but let it be known that such clever, witty, and erudite writing is much appreciated here, and it is bittersweet that it will never be duplicated.

[Ramesh Abhiraman · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have read perhaps 4 or 5 books (each different) by Dame Rebecca West.
She is a British national treasure much neglected.
In Black Lamb, Grey Falcon, a several hundred page travelogue through the Balkans, she explored their culture and history with fascinating detail.
In this book Survivors in Mexico, she brings a similar laser focus to the Conquistadors and details of the encounter with Montezuma. One feels one were there. Her discursive story telling is never distracting. She is never didactic.
She is one of the few historians I can read because they shirk no detail however gruesome, put no gloss, and yet are sufficiently humanistic that you and I can see that she understands when injustice was done.

[Tuck · Rating 5 out of 5]

sadly unfinished history and commentary of mexico, in the style of her masterpiece Black Lamb and Grey Falcon. west has this uncanny knack (or maybe it is her hard core work ethic, she needed some more decades to finish this mexico book, but did not have them) to meld history, culture, religion, real time examples, human nature into a prose that seems to explain social and political history. like laughter, she thinks a lot about how laughter does, or does not, travel through the centuries .

[Justinian]

2016-12 - Survivors in Mexico. Rebecca West (Author) Bernard Schweizer (Editor) 2003. 304 Pages.

Some people write great stories, Rebecca West might not be the best storyteller, but this book is not a story it is a collection of observations. Rebecca West though is simply one of the greatest at constructing a phrase in the English language. It is like a masterclass in phrasing and writing. The irony is that this book was never finished; it was cobbled together from her outline and notes for the book. It is a wild ride through her trips to Mexico in the 1960’s with stops at museums, observations on famous and infamous people, and a nation and its people. She may get a fact or detail wrong in hindsight but this is her observations and experiences and because of her omni-curiousity and writing acumen it is a ride I would encourage all of you to take.

[Richard · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was bedtime reading, a long time to accomplish. That was not West’s fault though this was a posthumous, edited publication.

My interest was/is a general ignorance of our southern neighbors but an awareness of their being exploited by US corporations and victimized by aggrandizing US pols. Starting with Trotsky,Kahlo, and Rivera, West takes the reader on a tour of the country’s recent and ancient past and the present. For someone like me, there is much to learn, though most of us have some idea of Cortez’s part in the destruction of the Aztec world and Diaz’s eyewitness account of events. West writes with extraordinary sympathy for all involved and presents a striking visual description of actors, sites, and events.

It is only very late in the volume that we discover a familial tie between her father and one of the important muralists of 20th-century Mexico, a reason for both her interest and presence in the country. She also cites two sources worth seeking out, Salvador da Madariaga and Octavio Paz.

And she places the history of the time in a European context, including art as well as politics, beginning as she does with Trotsky and ending with Mussolini.

A worthwhile read.

[Bryan Fox · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's remarkable how fresh and relevant a lot of the prose and the observations are in this book, but it suffers from a lack of focus in its latter half. What begins as an interesting reflection on then-contemporary (this was written in the mid-60s) Mexico devolves first into a historical treatise on the indigenous peoples of the country (also interesting, but out of place) and finally into an odd political survey (not all that interesting, AND out of place). I'm impressed by her writing, but this doesn't make me inclined to read her longer works.

[Jeff Keehr · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read a review of this posthumously published collection of essays in the NYT Book Review and got the book from EMU's library. It was timely because I recently saw the movie on Frieda Kahoe's (sp) life. But this covers a good deal a Mexican history and is told in West's ruthlessly honest style: Life is a bitch and then you die. I read it over the course of a month or so, during my lunch breaks at work, right after I did Tai Chi with Sara from the Web team. I didn't read the three book reviews at the end of the book because they seemed irrelevant to me.

[Bruce Graham · Rating 4 out of 5]

Because it was unfinished, it is a scattershot work. However, you get treated to some interesting insights, observations, and thoughts. These are what I read Ms. West for. She is one of the great unsung writers of the English language. Even if you are not overwhelmed with interest about Aztecs or Mexico, the book is worth investigating.

[Vagabond Geologist · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book. West is a wonderful writer and I enjoyed her observations. Like all writers, she has a perspective. I don’t always agree with that perspective but, as someone that has spent a lot of time in Mexico, I found them interesting and, more often than not, reasonable.

[Lori]

DNF. The writer seriously needed an editor that would rein in her overly detailed style.
Now that I see that it was written posthumously, I understand why it was so dense. Wish I could have read more because my interest in Mexico but I found it unreadable.

[Tim McKay · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another excellent written book, the subject matter wasn't high on my list.

[Catriona]

DNF

[Reader · Rating 3 out of 5]

My rating would swing from perhaps a 2 to a 5 from page to page, or even from sentence to sentence. I started this book while in San Miguel de Allende and most often found it enjoyable and fascinating. Rebecca West’s prose ranged from the beautiful and poetic to what was, to me, unnecessarily convoluted and difficult to follow. The book seemed a collection of personal essays that wandered about in accordance with West's whim, and not necessarily a clear pattern. The thing that really hooked me though, was that the sort of things that seem to interest West were most often exactly the things that equally interested me. In the end I enjoyed this book, and learned a great deal about Mexico, as well as much of the rest of the world.

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's hard to review this work because I admire West's writing so much, and parts of this book explode with the brilliant writing and insight I adore (who has ever written a sunset like she does? Who can make a failed trip to Coyoacan, only to find Frida Kahlo's house closed for repairs, into an interesting excursion and the starting point for an interesting essay?). I read parts of this on a recent trip to Mexico and there was much to admire, but I ultimately wanted to move onto something else. This is an unfinished book and it shows. I'm sure I'll be returning to it, and it is highly recommended for what it is, but it's hard to find it relevant to contemporary Mexico.

[Mallory · Rating 2 out of 5]

Another book added to my not-finished list. I found it interesting at first, but couldn't help but wonder the entire time how accurate of a picture of Mexico I was getting. I don't know the topic or the author well enough to judge, so I gave up trying.

[Fredrick Danysh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Published after her death, West tells some of the history of Mexican Indians as well as addressing social and political forces on them. This is more of personal accounts of her visit to Mexico.

[Francis · Rating 2 out of 5]

To me it seemed like a highly opinionated version of Mexican history and culture. I wasn't sure how much of it was based on research and how much was based on Rebecca West's view of the world.

[Mary Kristine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Would have given this a four if the editor would have provided historical perspectives to the essays. West writings were very personal and at times not political correct.

[A.D. Elliott · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rebecca's observations of Mexico - a rich character exploration with entertaining observations. I wish she had been able to finish the book.