Mexico Quotes

“Hide yourself in God, so when a man wants to find you he will have to go there first.”
― Shannon L. Alder

“Summertime is always the best of what might be.”
― Charles Bowden

“The world might indeed be a cursed circle; the snake swallowed its tail and there could be no end, only an eternal ruination and endless devouring.”
― Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Mexican Gothic

“La verdad es que mientras más enojado estoy con este país y más lejos viajo, más mexicano me siento.”
― Jorge Ibargüengoitia, Instrucciones para vivir en México

“I thought of the wilderness we had left behind us, open to sea and sky, joyous in its plenitude and simplicity, perfect yet vulnerable, unaware of what is coming, defended by nothing, guarded by no one.”
― Edward Abbey, Beyond the Wall: Essays from the Outside

“Good-bye -- if you hear of my being stood up against a stone wall and shot to rags please know that I think that a pretty good way to depart this life. It beats old age, disease or falling down the cellar stairs.”
― Ambrose Bierce

“Mineral cactai,
quicksilver lizards in the adobe walls,
the bird that punctures space,
thirst, tedium, clouds of dust,
impalpable epiphanies of wind.
The pines taught me to talk to myself.
In that garden I learnedto send myself off.
Later there were no gardens. ”
― Octavio Paz, A Draft of Shadows and Other Poems

“Nada somete más a un pueblo que la ignorancia; a pocas cosas temen más los soberanos que a un pueblo pensante.”
― Juan Miguel Zunzunegui, El Misterio Del Águila

“La resignación es una de nuestras virtudes populares. Más que el brillo de la victoria nos conmueve la entereza ante la adversidad.”
― Octavio Paz, The Labyrinth of Solitude and Other Writings

“(We loved Mother too, completely, but we were finding out, as Father was too, that it is good for parents and for children to be alone now and then with one another...the man alone or the woman, to sound new notes in the mysterious music of parenthood and childhood.)

That night I not only saw my Father for the first time as a person. I saw the golden hills and the live oaks as clearly as I have ever seen them since; and I saw the dimples in my little sister's fat hands in a way that still moves me because of that first time; and I saw food as something beautiful to be shared with people instead of as a thrice-daily necessity.”
― M.F.K. Fisher, The Gastronomical Me

“Sólo alguien con madurez puede ser libre, padre, pero sólo alguien libre puede madurar. No es posible que sea de otra forma.”
― Juan Miguel Zunzunegui, El Misterio Del Águila

“These paintings say Mexico is an ancient thing that will still go on forever telling its own story in slabs of color leaves and fruits and proud naked Indians in a history without shame. Their great city of Tenochtitlan is still here beneath our shoes and history was always just like today full of markets and wanting.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, The Lacuna

“El tamaño del narcotráfico en México equivale a la magnitud de la corrupción.”
― Rafel Rodriguez Castaneda, El México narco

“During one of these arguments, Diego picked up one of his paintings of the Mexican desert and shouted, "I don't want to go back to that!" He had spent fifteen years in Paris and the life of an expatriate suited him. It was easier to be a passionate Mexican nationalist when he wasn't living there”
― Malka Drucker, Frida Kahlo

“...perché chi è cresciuto qui, per quanto possa sembrare impossibile a chi vi ha passato pochi giorni con gli occhi lacrimosi e la gola bruciante, ama il suo De-Efe di un amore viscerale ed appassionato...”
― Pino Cacucci, La polvere del Messico

“Un pais donde el surrealismo es vida y la Muerte es una santa hecha de metal y resina”
― Jose Gil Olmos, La Santa Muerte

“El PRI salió de Los Pinos pero no del alma de México.”
― Jorge G. Castañeda, Un futuro para México

“Los blancos hicieron que estas tierras fueran extranjeras para el indio; hicieron que el indio comprara con su sangre el aire que respira.”
― Ermilo Abreu Gómez, Canek

“Vine a Comala porque me dijeron que acá vivía mi padre, un tal Pedro Páramo ...”
― Juan Rulfo, Pedro Páramo

“Kamishna … karibu," alisema Nafi huku akisimama na kutupa gazeti mezani na kuchukua karatasi ya faksi, iliyotumwa.
"Ahsante. Kuna nini …"
"Kamishna, imekuja faksi kutoka Oslo kama nilivyokueleza – katika simu. Inakutaka haraka, kesho, lazima kesho, kuwahi kikao Alhamisi mjini Copenhagen," alisema Nafi huku akimpa kamishna karatasi ya faksi.
"Mjini Copenhagen!" alisema kamishna kwa kutoamini.
"Ndiyo, kamishna … Sidhani kama kuna jambo la hatari lakini."
"Nafi, nini kimetokea!"
"Kamishna … sijui. Kwa kweli sijui. Ilipofika, hii faksi, kitu cha kwanza niliongea na watu wa WIS kupata uthibitisho wao. Nao hawajui. Huenda ni mauaji ya jana ya Meksiko. Hii ni siri kubwa ya tume kamishna, na ndiyo maana Oslo wakaingilia kati."
"Ndiyo. Kila mtu ameyasikia mauaji ya Meksiko. Ni mabaya. Kinachonishangaza ni kwamba, jana niliongea na makamu … kuhusu mabadiliko ya katiba ya WODEA. Hakunambia chochote kuhusu mkutano wa kesho!"
"Kamishna, nakusihi kuwa makini. Dalili zinaonyesha hali si nzuri hata kidogo. Hawa ni wadhalimu tu … wa madawa ya kulevya."
"Vyema!" alijibu kamishna kwa jeuri na hasira. Halafu akaendelea, "Kuna cha ziada?"
"Ijumaa, kama tulivyoongea wiki iliyopita, nasafiri kwenda Afrika Kusini."
"Kikao kinafanyika Alhamisi, Nafi, huwezi kusafiri Ijumaa …"
"Binti yangu atafukuzwa shule, kam …"
"Nafi, ongea na chuo … wambie umepata dharura utaondoka Jumatatu; utawaona Jumanne … Fuata maadili ya kazi tafadhali. Safari yako si muhimu hivyo kulinganisha na tume!"
"Sawa! Profesa. Niwie radhi, nimekuelewa, samahani sana. Samahani sana.”
― Enock Maregesi, Kolonia Santita

“[...] vous savez, un doute fait plus de mal qu'une déception.”
― Oscar Lewis, The Children of Sánchez

“Mexico has fairly strict gun laws. It actually has a right to bear arms in the Mexican constitution. But to do this - there's only one shop which sells them legally in the whole of Mexico, run by the army. You go, and then you have to present seven types of identification, including a letter from your employer and a clean criminal record. And the cartels, the gangsters, they don't use that way of getting guns 'cause they can get them so much more easily buying them in the United States.”
― Ioan Grillo

“En route to California I had a few drinks with an American executive for Falstaff Brewing Company who said he'd been a hobo from '37 to '39. He talked about a friend of his who had lost his legs beneath a freight train and died. He told me he knew something about farm labor contractors. "Killers," he called them. And said it again, "Killers.”
― Tracy Kidder, The Road to Yuba City: A Journey into the Juan Corona Murders

“In the early 1900s, while colonization continued, the original Mexican population of the Southwest was greatly increased by an immigration the continues today. This combination of centuries-old roots and relatively new ones gives the Mexican-American people a rich and varied cultural heritage.”
― Elizabeth Martínez, De Colores Means All of Us: Latina Views for a Multi-Colored Century

“The oppression and exploitation of Latinos (like Asians) have historical roots unknown to most Americans. People who learn at least a little about Black slavery remain totally ignorant about how the United States seized half of Mexico or how it has colonized Puerto Rico.”
― Elizabeth Martínez, De Colores Means All of Us: Latina Views for a Multi-Colored Century

“We can look to Mexico, where a vision for social change has been powerfully affirmed by the Maya people of Chiapas. They named their vision "Zapatismo," in memory of Mexican revolutionary Emiliano Zapata, and startled the world with an armed uprising on January 1, 1994. That day, and ever since, the Zapatistas have posed the basic problem: how to establish both identity and democracy? How to achieve a new life of dignity for indigenous people while also creating a Mexico of justice for everyone? Always the Zapatistas have said they do not want one without the other. At a 1996 meeting of Chicanas/os with some of the Zapatista leadership, Comandante Tacho began his presentation by saying: "We don't want power. What we want is decent homes, enough to eat, health care for our children, schools." At first I thought to myself: how can you gain those things without power? Then I realized that by power he meant domination. The Zapatista vision does not find the answer to injustice in the replacement of one domination by another, but in a vast change of the political culture from the bottom up that will create a revolutionary democracy.”
― Elizabeth Martínez, De Colores Means All of Us: Latina Views for a Multi-Colored Century

“Escribir sobre la ciudad de México es una empresa destinada al fracaso. Ignorante de esto, durante mucho tiempo pensé que para escribir sobre el DF debía imitar la tradición: convertirme, a lo Walter Benjamin, en una connaisseuse de las banquetas, botánica de la flora urbana, arqueóloga amateur de las fachadas del centro y los anuncios espectaculares del periférico. He intentado caminar como una petite Baudelaire por Copilco: imposible extraer una sola línea sobre Eje 10. ¿Será culpa de Copilco? Oí a alguien decir alguna vez que Copilco venía del náhuatl 'lugar de las copias'. Tras repetidas caminatas por aquella zona, puedo concluir sin temor a equivocarme que con eso queda dicho lo único que se puede decir sobre esa feísima porción de la ciudad, apéndice enfermizo de la Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, donde se reproducen masivamente los libros de sus bibliotecas a diez centavos por página. Quizá sea culpa de Copilco.”
― Valeria Luiselli, Papeles falsos

“Spanish is the lovin’ tongue,
Soft as music, light as spray.
’Twas a girl I learnt it from,
Livin’ down Sonora way.
I don’t look much like a lover,
Yet I say her love words over,
Often when I’m all alone—
“Mi amor, mi corazon.”

Nights when she knew where I’d ride,
She would listen for my spurs,
Throw the big door open wide,
Raise them laughin’ eyes of hers.
And my heart would nigh stop beatin'
When I heard her tender greeting,
Whispered soft for me alone—
“Mi amor! mi corazon!”

Moonlight in the patio,
Old señora noddin’ near,
Me and Juana talkin’ low
So the Madre couldn’t hear—
How those hours would go a-flyin’!
And too soon I’d hear her sighin’
In her little sorry tone—
“Adios, mi corazon!”

But one time I had to fly
For a foolish gamblin’ fight,
And we said a swift goodbye
In that black, unlucky night.
When I’d loosed her arms from clingin’
With her words the hoofs kep’ ringin’
As I galloped north alone—
“Adios, mi corazon!”

Never seen her since that night.
I kaint cross the Line, you know.
She was Mex and I was white;
Like as not, it’s better so.
Yet I’ve always sort of missed her
Since that last, wild night I kissed her,
Left her heart and lost my own—
“Adios, mi corazon!”
― Charles Badger Clark, Sun and Saddle Leather

“Blood. This country is give much blood. This Mexico. This is a thirsty country. The blood of a thousand Christs. Nothing”
― Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West

“We'll never know the exact number of victims of the Dirty War [Guerra Sucia]. My novel is noir, pulp fiction, but it's based on a real story.”
― Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Velvet Was the Night