Alfredo Corchado's Blog

Dear Friends–

It was a huge pleasure to talk to Dave Davies about #MidnightinMexico earlier this week. I was honored to be on Fresh Air and am thankful for all of the feedback I’ve heard since it aired. If you haven’t had a chance to listen yet, here’s the link.

The book tour continues, so please keep checking back at  for new dates. West Coast dates have just been added in mid-late August.

Thanks again for all your support!

Abrazos,

Alfredo

Here are a few recent pieces/speeches that have addressed “Midnight in Mexico” — David Brooks’s speech at NACLA; Raul Rodriguez’s personal note about the book (in Spanish); & Samantha Stronge’s introduction in Sebastapol, CA

Midnight in Mexico presentation at NACLA.  New York, June 26.  David Brooks.

A dark title indeed.  I always wanted to use a familiar quote, and given the dark title, I have no choice but to do it now:  Groucho Marx said “Outside of a dog, a book is a man’s best friend.  Inside a dog it’s too dark to read”.

But is this book too dark to read, inside or outside of a dog?

What is surprising about the book is, despite its subtitle about a journey through a “country’s descent into darkness,” is that it is written from light.

Ryszard Kapuscinski, the grand international reporter commented in an interview that journalism is a profession “that cannot be done right by anyone who is a cynic.  You have to differentiate: one thing is being a skeptic, realists, prudent.

That is absolutely necessary, otherwise you can’t do journalism.  But something very different is to be cynical, an incompatible attitude with the profession of journalism.  Cynicism is an inhuman attitude, one that automatically distances us from our work…. You have to value what you do… you have to be very human”.

Kapuscinski goes on to talk about reporting as trying to tell stories to confront amnesia, to confront absurdity, to reveal our world to ourselves, and to be there when miracles happen, which they do, but they must to be told, reported, to everyone, everywhere to matter, to make any difference.

You have to care, deeply care, about who and what that you are writing about.  After all, this is a collective process at the end – all work, good journalistic work is essentially a collective endeavor from start to finish.  And if you can’t give a damn about those that are your story, you become, well, cynical.

Alfredo understands this and that makes this book quite different from so many others that attempt to explain Mexico and the US to us over the years.

This major distinction between this opus and many others that describe Mexico’s contemporary battles has to do with something that Alfredo confesses at the beginning, middle and end of the book  – he is “in love with Mexico.”  Now, I challenge you to find another non-fiction book by a journalist that has a line like that in it.  But as I realized this, I knew why such a dark story needs to be told, and needs to be read.  Because that love is what saves us from another dark book, of which there are too many, all claiming to be in the name of “truth” and facts and “analysis.”

This book is many parallel stories, of saying goodbye in, as Berger calls it, the century of goodbyes, of returns, of reappearance and of disappearances, of witness of shadows and demand for light, of the personal journey between and in between two worlds colliding not only at borders, but deep inside each other, and a collective search for another dawn right at the midnight hour.

Because of all this, I would say that, outside or inside of a dog, Alfredo is, for all who care about this, one of our best friends.

Raul Rodriguez (noted expert on Mexico) sent me a personal note about the book (in Spanish)

Alfredo:

Tu libro es ante todo conmovedor, por decir lo menos.   Muy inquietante, en especial para quienes nos resuena en la diáspora.   La manera en que entrelazas el drama de México y de nuestra vecindad con tu propia historia ancla y da contexto, lo mantiene a uno en vilo.   Se siente como esas crónicas tan personales — confesiones, a la vez que cartas de ruta y recalada — de los hombres de las generaciones del Ateneo a los Contemporáneos, goznes de esa época, donde todo en México parecía pendiente de definición, donde cada transición resultaba tortuosa.   Eres parte de esas voces, con el mismo México tan asombroso como trágico, en distinto siglo, with a Texan cadence.

De Vasconcelos — el viejo José, no José Luis S. — a Cuesta, vivían intensamente a México, lo relataban entrañablemente, en una senda de expiación y ansia de identidad.   En la mejor tradición emersoniana, toda historia es biografía.   Y esas biografías tejían la narrativa de los dilemas y desencuentros de la patria.  Como apuntara Alfonso Reyes en su diario hace justo un siglo, “caen tiros…”, y resultan “el escenario natural de la vida”.

Nos decía John Phillip Santos en tu conferencia que quizás el vértice de todo esto se resuma en una palabra: reconciliación.   ¿O su ausencia, pregunto yo?   Tu andar, tu osadía y tus motivos tienen sabor más bien a algo más profundo: a anhelo de redención.   Liberación, salvación, más que simple apaciguamiento.  Y pese a la penumbra de medianoche, nos dejas de manera impensada con palabras similares a las de César Cansino:  “las ruinas de hoy no tienen por qué ser eternas…”   O como apunta Julián Herbert, “todo abismo tiene sus canciones de cuna…”.

Por lo pronto, nuestra tierra sigue estando en el “almost there”, en la hechura a medias.   Por lo pronto, como sabiamente te insiste tu madre, lo único que queda es la fe.

Me llamó la atención tan sólo una omisión.   A mi juicio te quedaste corto — la pauta te la pudo dar el uso de “licenciado” — en tus alusiones a la hermana gemela de la cultura de impunidad: la sociedad de castas que pervive afanosa y enraizada en México, con todos sus ingredientes de discriminación, inequidad, sinecuras y mayorazgos.    Clasismo, racismo, xenofobia, exclusión, intolerancia, desprecio, privilegio, prepotencia; todos hechos hábito.

Espero verte muy pronto, para felicitarte con un tequila decente de por medio.

Un abrazo,

Raúl

Samantha Stronge’s introduction of “Midnight in Mexico” in Sebastapol, California

As someone whose knowledge of Mexico’s history, political system, and culture hardly extends beyond  what I learned in my high school history classes, as well as the limited reports shown on television news, I found Alfredo Corchado’s “Midnight in Mexico” eye-opening, to say the least. In this memoir, Alfredo seamlessly weaves the history of Mexico’s tumultuous political system and at times uncertain relationship with the United States with his own riveting and deeply intertwined story as a journalist who refuses to give up on his home country, even when his life is on the line. Despite the unstable history of Mexico’s government as well as the threat that he could become a victim of this corrupt system, Alfredo’s story is undeniably and amazingly hopeful—hopeful for Mexico’s ability to emerge from this “descent into darkness.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hey all– the day is almost here! Take a look at the tour schedule to see where I’ll be in the next few months. Sign up here for the kickoff events in Dallas. Thanks for all your support!

We had over 1000 entries for the raffle, and only 20 winners selected. But for all of those who did not get picked, keep your eyes peeled for updates – we may hold another raffle in the next few months! Here are the lucky winners:

Greg Bonhomme


Kim Guillaume


Lauren LaLonde


J.D. Simone


Kimberly DaCosta


Morty Ortega


Carleen O’Brien


Sean Corley Burke


Jennifer Brimley


Amanda Krause


Melinda Berger


Arenette Gigi


Monica Mcfadden


Padma Seemangal


Ivana Lee


Abernathy Peterson


Kyle Budde


Sarah Cauthon


Jennifer Cheatham


Samantha Koski

Thanks to all who made last night a great evening! Here’s an article from The Monitor by Jacob Fischler about the event.

Download (PDF, 304KB)

Come join me for the Centennial Lecture at The University of Texas at El Paso | 500 West University Avenue | El Paso, Texas 79968 | (915) 747-5000– UGLC 126 (Wiggins Road behind the Centennial Museum)at 5PM.

Thanks for a great conversation, Andrés!

Thanks for a great conversation, Andrés!