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Insurgent Mexico
American journalist John 'Jack' Reed writes, on the scene, describing the Mexican Revolution of 1914. He gives an excellent realistic account of the Mexican Indians & peons that have suffered under a brutal dictatorship. He writes about the time he spent in Northern Mexico with Pancho Villa & the war in the desert. It was hard for him as a Gringo as most Americans had only gone to Mexico to plunder the environment. Read "The White Rose' by Bruno Traven & his other 'jungle' series books about the exploitation of Indian Mexican's. Many would say that Jack Reed took over from Jack London in his war reporting, since Jack had just died in 1914. Jack Reed's other famous book "Ten Days That Shook The World" is about the Red October (Boleshvik) Russian Revolution--the movie "Reds" by Warren Beaty is Jack Reed's story.
292 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1914
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1724 people want to read
About the author
John Reed
53 books146 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
American journalist John Silas Reed, a correspondent of World War I, recounted an experience in Petrograd during the revolution of October 1917 in Ten Days That Shook the World (1919) and, after returning to the United States, cofounded the Communist labor party in 1919; people buried his body in the Kremlin, the citadel, housing the offices of the Russian government and formerly those of the Soviet government, in Moscow.
This poet and Communist activist first gained prominence as a war correspondent during the Mexican revolution for Metropolitan magazine and during World War I for the magazine The Masses. People best know his coverage.
Reed supported the Soviet takeover of Russia and even briefly took up arms to join the Red guards in 1918. He expected a similar Communist revolution in the United States with the short-lived organization.
He died in Moscow of spotted typhus. At the time of his death, he perhaps soured on the Soviet leadership, but the Soviet Union gave him burial of a hero, one of only three Americans at the Kremlin wall necropolis.
American journalist John Silas Reed, a correspondent of World War I, recounted an experience in Petrograd during the revolution of October 1917 in Ten Days That Shook the World (1919) and, after returning to the United States, cofounded the Communist labor party in 1919; people buried his body in the Kremlin, the citadel, housing the offices of the Russian government and formerly those of the Soviet government, in Moscow.
This poet and Communist activist first gained prominence as a war correspondent during the Mexican revolution for Metropolitan magazine and during World War I for the magazine The Masses. People best know his coverage.
Reed supported the Soviet takeover of Russia and even briefly took up arms to join the Red guards in 1918. He expected a similar Communist revolution in the United States with the short-lived organization.
He died in Moscow of spotted typhus. At the time of his death, he perhaps soured on the Soviet leadership, but the Soviet Union gave him burial of a hero, one of only three Americans at the Kremlin wall necropolis.
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May 25, 2008
My great great grandfather wrote this book. He was a famous war journalist. This one is about time he spent in Mexico with Pancho Villa and his gang, during the revoultion in the early 1900s. The other well-known book of his is "Ten Days that Shook the World," --about the russian revolution.He was an influence on Hemingway and others as far as journalism and war writing goes.
January 8, 2025
The insurgent forces in Mexico, during the early years of that country’s Revolution of 1910-20, were fortunate to have a thoughtful and perceptive American journalist in their midst – for a young John Reed was in Mexico to report on the war. Sent to Mexico in 1913 by the editors of Metropolitan Magazine, Reed deployed his talents for observation and his muscular, evocative prose style to provide a series of vivid portraits of the revolution, its leaders, and its ordinary people, both civilian and military. The articles that he published in Metropolitan Magazine were eventually republished, in book form, as Insurgent Mexico (1914) – a book that remains a valuable look at the Mexican Revolution in all its heroism and ambiguity.
Nowadays, John Reed is probably best-known as the man who travelled to revolutionary Russia, vocally supported the October Revolution, and chronicled the Bolsheviks’ rise to power in his book Ten Days That Shook the World (1919). Years before those events, however, certain elements of Reed’s character and work were becoming apparent. Born into comfortable circumstances in Portland, Oregon, and educated at Harvard, Reed early evinced an affinity for leftist labor politics; 1913, the year in which he departed to write about Mexico’s revolution, was also the year of his first arrest, for advocating on behalf of striking silk-mill workers in Paterson, New Jersey. The other thing about John Reed that people learned, very quickly, was that he was an insightful observer and a sharp, thoughtful writer.
Reed’s talents for descriptive writing make themselves apparent early in Insurgent Mexico, when he describes a carriage ride across the Mexican desert:
In the late sunshine, the desert was a glowing thing. We rode in a silent, enchanted land that seemed some kingdom under the sea. All around were great cactuses colored red, blue, purple, yellow, as coral is on the ocean bed. Behind us, to the west, the coach rolled along in a glory of dust like Elijah’s chariot….Eastward, under a sky already darkening to stars, were the rumpled mountains behind which lay La Cadena, the advance post of the Maderista army. It was a land to love – this Mexico – a land to fight for. (p. 52)
Reed is comparably thorough and incisive in writing about the people of the revolution, and he seems particularly interested in, and impressed by, Pancho Villa. The impression of Villa that emerges from the book is quite positive. In Reed’s view, Villa is a gifted leader who is humbled by the successes he has achieved and the following he has gained. Invited to the governor’s palace in Chihuahua city to be presented with a medal, Villa “hesitated for a minute, pulling his mustache and looking very uncomfortable,” before he “finally gravitated toward the throne…and then sat down” (p. 106). The medal is bestowed upon Villa, and Villa jokes that “This is a hell of a little thing to give a man for all that heroism you are talking about!” (p. 106), prompting appreciative laughter from those in attendance. But then things turn serious:
They waited for him to speak – to make a conventional address of acceptance. But as he looked around the room at these brilliant, educated men, who said that they would die for Villa, the peon, and meant it – and as he caught sight through the door of the ragged soldiers, who had forgotten their rigidity and were crowding eagerly into the corridor with eyes fixed eagerly on the compañero that they loved, he realized something of what the Revolution signified.
Puckering up his face, as he did always when he concentrated intensely, he leaned across the table in front of him and poured out, in a voice so low that people could hardly hear: “There is no word to speak. All I can say is my heart is all to you.” (p. 107)
It is clear that Reed is impressed with Villa as a leader who embraces his good fortune with humility, believes in the egalitarian values of the Revolution, and appreciates the bravery and suffering of his troops.
At another point, Reed recounts an interview he had with Villa in a manner that reinforces his positive impressions of the revolutionary leader. He suggests that “It might not be uninteresting to know the passionate dream – the vision which animates this ignorant fighter, ‘not educated enough to be President of Mexico’” (p. 135). After offering this ironic dismissal of Villa’s elitist critics, Reed quotes one of Villa’s core ideas: “When the new Republic is established, there will never be any more army in Mexico. Armies are the greatest support of tyranny. There can be no dictator without an army” (p. 135). Reed’s admiration for Villa is palpable.
At the same time, I can’t help taking issue with Reed’s oh-so-positive view of Villa. The period during which Reed was in Mexico, talking with Villa, was during the early phases of the revolution, before the revolutionary movement split in two after the ousting of the dictator Victoriano Huerta. The broken promises of which Villa was capable were not yet apparent. Nor was his predilection for behavior that could be imprudent – as with his attack on Columbus, New Mexico, U.S.A., in 1916 – or downright cruel, as with his troops’ atrocities at what came to be known as the “rape of Namiquipa” in Chihuahua state in 1917.
It might also be added that Pancho Villa is known to have been canny in crafting his own image, courting international journalists like Reed as well as U.S. filmmakers in Hollywood. Perhaps Villa knew what Reed wanted in a Mexican revolutionary hero, and gave Reed the version of Villa that Reed could be counted upon to praise.
Things that I liked better about Insurgent Mexico included the way Reed – in stark contrast with the racist sentiments expressed by many of the U.S. Anglos that he encountered in Mexico – emphasized his appreciation for the ordinary Mexican people, and for the nuances of Mexican culture. At one point, he recounts a time when a group of impoverished Mexican peons offered hospitality to Reed and his companions:
They protested that their families and their houses were entirely ours, to be used as we saw fit with the greatest delight on their part. I do not remember how we finally managed to evade the invitation without wounding them, but I do recall that it took half an hour of courteous talking. For we knew, in the first place, that we would be unable to leave for hours in the morning if we accepted, because Mexican manners are that haste to leave a house signifies dissatisfaction with the entertainment; and then, too, one could not pay for one’s lodging, but would have to bestow a handsome present upon the hosts – which we could none of us afford. (p. 155)
I also appreciated the vividness with which Reed conveys the drama and urgency of battlefield action, When Reed witnesses a moment of anxiety, as news spreads of a repulse of the Constitutionalist forces, he sets forth the ensuing chaos quite powerfully:
Almost immediately a change seemed to come in the sound of the rifle fire, as if half of it had been suddenly cut off. At the same time, twenty bugles shrilled. Rising, I noticed a line of running horsemen fleeing up the track, shouting something. More followed, galloping, at the place where the railroad passed beyond the trees on its way into town. The cavalry had been repulsed. All at once the whole plain squirmed with men, mounted and on foot, all running rearward. One man threw away his blanket, another his rifle. They thickened over the hot desert, stamping up the dust, until the flat was crowded with them. Right in front of me a horseman burst out of the brush, shouting, “The Federals are coming! To the trains! They are right behind!” The entire Constitutionalist army was routed! I caught up my blanket and took to my heels. A little way farther on, I came upon a cannon abandoned in the desert, traces cut, mules gone. Underfoot were guns, cartridge-belts, and dozens of serapes. It was a rout. Coming to an open space, I saw ahead a large crowd of fleeing soldiers, without rifles. Suddenly three men on horseback swept across in front of them, waving their arms and yelling. “Go back!” they cried out. “They aren’t coming out! Go back, for the love of God!” Two I didn’t recognize. The other was Villa. (p. 209)
Reed’s positive impressions of Villa are in stark contrast with his criticism of Venustiano Carranza, another of Mexico’s revolutionary leaders (and one who would eventually break with Villa). In Part Five of Insurgent Mexico, “Carranza – An Impression,” Reed writes that Carranza “marched his forces from Coahuila, where things were happening, straight across the Republic into the State of Sonora, where nothing was happening” (p. 241). While a variety of potential explanations for this transcontinental maneuver are offered, Reed dismisses it, saying that “Carranza hibernated until early in the spring of this year, when, the purpose of his Sonora sojourn evidently having been accomplished, he turned his face toward the territory where the real Revolution was being fought” (p. 241).
Before seeing Carranza, Reed is told by Isidro Fabela, Secretary of Foreign Relations, that there are a number of questions that Carranza absolutely will not answer, including questions that “dealt rather specifically with the platform of the Constitutionalist government, such as land distribution, direct election, and the right of suffrage among the peons” (p. 246).
Told that he must promise not to ask Carranza any questions, Reed assents; but when Reed, whilst shaking hands with Carranza, says in Spanish, “Señor Don Venustiano, my paper is your friend and the friend of the Constitutionalists” (p. 249), Carranza’s response is an unexpected and angry denunciation of British and American policies regarding Mexico. Reed seems gobsmacked by what has occurred; he writes that “I tried to think that here was the voice of aroused Mexico thundering at her enemies; but it seemed like nothing so much as a slightly senile old man, tired and irritated” (p. 251).
Carranza’s men seem as out-of-touch as Carranza himself, in terms of their disconnection from the ordinary people for whom the Mexican Revolution is presumably being fought. Reed reports that while he was at Carranza’s headquarters, “I tried often to get from these Cabinet members the least expression of what their plans were for the settlement of the troubles which caused the Revolution; but they seemed to have none, except a Constitutional Government. During all the times I talked with them, I never detected one gleam of sympathy for, or understanding of, the peons” (p. 251).
As one drinks a margarita with a good bit of salt around the rim of the glass, so I find myself having to take John Reed’s work with the proverbial grain of salt. His political beliefs are so intrinsic to his literary sensibility that, when he is chronicling a revolutionary situation, he often sees what he wants to see. That being said, Insurgent Mexico still holds value as a first-person account of the early stages of the Mexican Revolution.
Nowadays, John Reed is probably best-known as the man who travelled to revolutionary Russia, vocally supported the October Revolution, and chronicled the Bolsheviks’ rise to power in his book Ten Days That Shook the World (1919). Years before those events, however, certain elements of Reed’s character and work were becoming apparent. Born into comfortable circumstances in Portland, Oregon, and educated at Harvard, Reed early evinced an affinity for leftist labor politics; 1913, the year in which he departed to write about Mexico’s revolution, was also the year of his first arrest, for advocating on behalf of striking silk-mill workers in Paterson, New Jersey. The other thing about John Reed that people learned, very quickly, was that he was an insightful observer and a sharp, thoughtful writer.
Reed’s talents for descriptive writing make themselves apparent early in Insurgent Mexico, when he describes a carriage ride across the Mexican desert:
In the late sunshine, the desert was a glowing thing. We rode in a silent, enchanted land that seemed some kingdom under the sea. All around were great cactuses colored red, blue, purple, yellow, as coral is on the ocean bed. Behind us, to the west, the coach rolled along in a glory of dust like Elijah’s chariot….Eastward, under a sky already darkening to stars, were the rumpled mountains behind which lay La Cadena, the advance post of the Maderista army. It was a land to love – this Mexico – a land to fight for. (p. 52)
Reed is comparably thorough and incisive in writing about the people of the revolution, and he seems particularly interested in, and impressed by, Pancho Villa. The impression of Villa that emerges from the book is quite positive. In Reed’s view, Villa is a gifted leader who is humbled by the successes he has achieved and the following he has gained. Invited to the governor’s palace in Chihuahua city to be presented with a medal, Villa “hesitated for a minute, pulling his mustache and looking very uncomfortable,” before he “finally gravitated toward the throne…and then sat down” (p. 106). The medal is bestowed upon Villa, and Villa jokes that “This is a hell of a little thing to give a man for all that heroism you are talking about!” (p. 106), prompting appreciative laughter from those in attendance. But then things turn serious:
They waited for him to speak – to make a conventional address of acceptance. But as he looked around the room at these brilliant, educated men, who said that they would die for Villa, the peon, and meant it – and as he caught sight through the door of the ragged soldiers, who had forgotten their rigidity and were crowding eagerly into the corridor with eyes fixed eagerly on the compañero that they loved, he realized something of what the Revolution signified.
Puckering up his face, as he did always when he concentrated intensely, he leaned across the table in front of him and poured out, in a voice so low that people could hardly hear: “There is no word to speak. All I can say is my heart is all to you.” (p. 107)
It is clear that Reed is impressed with Villa as a leader who embraces his good fortune with humility, believes in the egalitarian values of the Revolution, and appreciates the bravery and suffering of his troops.
At another point, Reed recounts an interview he had with Villa in a manner that reinforces his positive impressions of the revolutionary leader. He suggests that “It might not be uninteresting to know the passionate dream – the vision which animates this ignorant fighter, ‘not educated enough to be President of Mexico’” (p. 135). After offering this ironic dismissal of Villa’s elitist critics, Reed quotes one of Villa’s core ideas: “When the new Republic is established, there will never be any more army in Mexico. Armies are the greatest support of tyranny. There can be no dictator without an army” (p. 135). Reed’s admiration for Villa is palpable.
At the same time, I can’t help taking issue with Reed’s oh-so-positive view of Villa. The period during which Reed was in Mexico, talking with Villa, was during the early phases of the revolution, before the revolutionary movement split in two after the ousting of the dictator Victoriano Huerta. The broken promises of which Villa was capable were not yet apparent. Nor was his predilection for behavior that could be imprudent – as with his attack on Columbus, New Mexico, U.S.A., in 1916 – or downright cruel, as with his troops’ atrocities at what came to be known as the “rape of Namiquipa” in Chihuahua state in 1917.
It might also be added that Pancho Villa is known to have been canny in crafting his own image, courting international journalists like Reed as well as U.S. filmmakers in Hollywood. Perhaps Villa knew what Reed wanted in a Mexican revolutionary hero, and gave Reed the version of Villa that Reed could be counted upon to praise.
Things that I liked better about Insurgent Mexico included the way Reed – in stark contrast with the racist sentiments expressed by many of the U.S. Anglos that he encountered in Mexico – emphasized his appreciation for the ordinary Mexican people, and for the nuances of Mexican culture. At one point, he recounts a time when a group of impoverished Mexican peons offered hospitality to Reed and his companions:
They protested that their families and their houses were entirely ours, to be used as we saw fit with the greatest delight on their part. I do not remember how we finally managed to evade the invitation without wounding them, but I do recall that it took half an hour of courteous talking. For we knew, in the first place, that we would be unable to leave for hours in the morning if we accepted, because Mexican manners are that haste to leave a house signifies dissatisfaction with the entertainment; and then, too, one could not pay for one’s lodging, but would have to bestow a handsome present upon the hosts – which we could none of us afford. (p. 155)
I also appreciated the vividness with which Reed conveys the drama and urgency of battlefield action, When Reed witnesses a moment of anxiety, as news spreads of a repulse of the Constitutionalist forces, he sets forth the ensuing chaos quite powerfully:
Almost immediately a change seemed to come in the sound of the rifle fire, as if half of it had been suddenly cut off. At the same time, twenty bugles shrilled. Rising, I noticed a line of running horsemen fleeing up the track, shouting something. More followed, galloping, at the place where the railroad passed beyond the trees on its way into town. The cavalry had been repulsed. All at once the whole plain squirmed with men, mounted and on foot, all running rearward. One man threw away his blanket, another his rifle. They thickened over the hot desert, stamping up the dust, until the flat was crowded with them. Right in front of me a horseman burst out of the brush, shouting, “The Federals are coming! To the trains! They are right behind!” The entire Constitutionalist army was routed! I caught up my blanket and took to my heels. A little way farther on, I came upon a cannon abandoned in the desert, traces cut, mules gone. Underfoot were guns, cartridge-belts, and dozens of serapes. It was a rout. Coming to an open space, I saw ahead a large crowd of fleeing soldiers, without rifles. Suddenly three men on horseback swept across in front of them, waving their arms and yelling. “Go back!” they cried out. “They aren’t coming out! Go back, for the love of God!” Two I didn’t recognize. The other was Villa. (p. 209)
Reed’s positive impressions of Villa are in stark contrast with his criticism of Venustiano Carranza, another of Mexico’s revolutionary leaders (and one who would eventually break with Villa). In Part Five of Insurgent Mexico, “Carranza – An Impression,” Reed writes that Carranza “marched his forces from Coahuila, where things were happening, straight across the Republic into the State of Sonora, where nothing was happening” (p. 241). While a variety of potential explanations for this transcontinental maneuver are offered, Reed dismisses it, saying that “Carranza hibernated until early in the spring of this year, when, the purpose of his Sonora sojourn evidently having been accomplished, he turned his face toward the territory where the real Revolution was being fought” (p. 241).
Before seeing Carranza, Reed is told by Isidro Fabela, Secretary of Foreign Relations, that there are a number of questions that Carranza absolutely will not answer, including questions that “dealt rather specifically with the platform of the Constitutionalist government, such as land distribution, direct election, and the right of suffrage among the peons” (p. 246).
Told that he must promise not to ask Carranza any questions, Reed assents; but when Reed, whilst shaking hands with Carranza, says in Spanish, “Señor Don Venustiano, my paper is your friend and the friend of the Constitutionalists” (p. 249), Carranza’s response is an unexpected and angry denunciation of British and American policies regarding Mexico. Reed seems gobsmacked by what has occurred; he writes that “I tried to think that here was the voice of aroused Mexico thundering at her enemies; but it seemed like nothing so much as a slightly senile old man, tired and irritated” (p. 251).
Carranza’s men seem as out-of-touch as Carranza himself, in terms of their disconnection from the ordinary people for whom the Mexican Revolution is presumably being fought. Reed reports that while he was at Carranza’s headquarters, “I tried often to get from these Cabinet members the least expression of what their plans were for the settlement of the troubles which caused the Revolution; but they seemed to have none, except a Constitutional Government. During all the times I talked with them, I never detected one gleam of sympathy for, or understanding of, the peons” (p. 251).
As one drinks a margarita with a good bit of salt around the rim of the glass, so I find myself having to take John Reed’s work with the proverbial grain of salt. His political beliefs are so intrinsic to his literary sensibility that, when he is chronicling a revolutionary situation, he often sees what he wants to see. That being said, Insurgent Mexico still holds value as a first-person account of the early stages of the Mexican Revolution.
February 18, 2014
Lo confieso, estoy tan atrasada en leer libros sobre la historia de mi propio país que me encanta que este libro haya caído justo ahora en mis manos.
Ame como John Reed describe, sin juzgar y de manera sencilla y abierta todo lo que vivió mientras estuvo junto al ejercito constitucionalista y Pancho Villa. Ni siquiera es todo acerca de las batallas, es acerca de la gente que formo parte de esa lucha, los soldados y los arrieros, las mujeres y los niños, su manera de vivir el día a día, de sobrellevar la dura vida sin perder la ganas de cantar unos cuantos corridos, de bailar 3 días seguidos o hasta compartir un poco de cafe y tortillas con el compadre al que apenas acaban de conocer... Reed fue un tipo muy afortunado en ver lo que vio y vivir ese momento, ame su narrativa y la manera como describió esa parte de México que ahora me es un poco menos desconocida.
Como bien lo dijo, México era un país por el que vale la pena luchar. Y aún lo es.
Ame como John Reed describe, sin juzgar y de manera sencilla y abierta todo lo que vivió mientras estuvo junto al ejercito constitucionalista y Pancho Villa. Ni siquiera es todo acerca de las batallas, es acerca de la gente que formo parte de esa lucha, los soldados y los arrieros, las mujeres y los niños, su manera de vivir el día a día, de sobrellevar la dura vida sin perder la ganas de cantar unos cuantos corridos, de bailar 3 días seguidos o hasta compartir un poco de cafe y tortillas con el compadre al que apenas acaban de conocer... Reed fue un tipo muy afortunado en ver lo que vio y vivir ese momento, ame su narrativa y la manera como describió esa parte de México que ahora me es un poco menos desconocida.
Como bien lo dijo, México era un país por el que vale la pena luchar. Y aún lo es.
October 23, 2017
4,5
This is non-fiction but it reads like fiction. It was so enthralling also thanks to the descriptive language of Reed. I didn't know much about the Mexican revolution of 1913-1914 and this is a good book to have some informations about it. It isn't very informative or complete, it isn't a history book full of dates and names, but John Reed was in Mexico as a news correspondent and travelled, lived, slept and ate with the revolutionaries so the reader has a view from the inside, about the common people who fought and why they fought. This view is realistic, sometimes also lyric above all when the author describes the landscape, and I prefer this way to talk about history instead of "boring" books full of too many dates and names. The reader also knows about Mexicans of that time, their customs and habits, their hopes and their way of living.
The book has 5 parts and nearly every part is dedicated to a fight John Reed witnessed: the fight in the state of Durango, the fight of Pancho Villa and his army to conquer the city Gómez Palacio, but there is also a chapter dedicated only to introduce Pancho Villa to the reader, and the last chapter is dedicated to a famous Mexican celebration. In the chapters dedicated to the fights, Reed doesn't talk about strategies and the like, but he talks about the people that took part in it, how they lived those days. Several Mexicans liked John Reed, others wanted to kill him only because he was a gringo and in some parts it is also humorous. By sure it is never boring, it is a real pageturner.
This is non-fiction but it reads like fiction. It was so enthralling also thanks to the descriptive language of Reed. I didn't know much about the Mexican revolution of 1913-1914 and this is a good book to have some informations about it. It isn't very informative or complete, it isn't a history book full of dates and names, but John Reed was in Mexico as a news correspondent and travelled, lived, slept and ate with the revolutionaries so the reader has a view from the inside, about the common people who fought and why they fought. This view is realistic, sometimes also lyric above all when the author describes the landscape, and I prefer this way to talk about history instead of "boring" books full of too many dates and names. The reader also knows about Mexicans of that time, their customs and habits, their hopes and their way of living.
The book has 5 parts and nearly every part is dedicated to a fight John Reed witnessed: the fight in the state of Durango, the fight of Pancho Villa and his army to conquer the city Gómez Palacio, but there is also a chapter dedicated only to introduce Pancho Villa to the reader, and the last chapter is dedicated to a famous Mexican celebration. In the chapters dedicated to the fights, Reed doesn't talk about strategies and the like, but he talks about the people that took part in it, how they lived those days. Several Mexicans liked John Reed, others wanted to kill him only because he was a gringo and in some parts it is also humorous. By sure it is never boring, it is a real pageturner.
April 24, 2013
This is a tough book to rate fairly on a five star scale, especially without resort to half-stars. Reed writes lyrical, detailed paeans to the land and people of northern mexico and paints vivid portraits of Pancho Villa, Venustiano Carranza, and a multitude of other people he met during his infiltration of the Constitutionalist forces. Strangely, though, most reviews and recommendations of "Insurgent Mexico" refer to it as a journalistic work, and as such it falls flat on its face. Reed does not bother with dates, maps, or exegesis of tactics and strategy on any level other than what he personally observes. This makes for an entertaining, page-turning read, but also a bewildering one. One would expect a war correspondent to ask more strategic questions of Pancho Villa given the extensive access Reed possessed. Finally, while very well-written --albeit in the flowery early 20th century style of a swashbuckling adventure that may annoy and distract some contemporary readers-- Reed exhibits the racism and lazy stereotypes common to the Anglo-American upper class of his generation (think Hemingway & Conrad). I feel comfortable leveling this criticism because other more intellectually rigorous writers of his and earlier eras manage to avoid this sin (e.g., William Howard Russell, Charles Bean, George Wingrove Cooke, and especially Kit Coleman). "Insurgent Mexico" ranks as an entertaining adventure story of the first order, but I recommend that any reader who wants to understand the Mexican Revolution should read it with a topographical map at hand, AFTER reading a general history of the Revolution.
March 2, 2019
Sort of an odd book. This is not really a history of the Mexican Revolution in any sense; rather it is a series of reports filed by John Reed in his capacity as a journalist attached to Pancho Villa's Division of the North in early 1914. Reading it, you will not get much of an understanding of the overall revolution and associated civil wars, or even of the troop movements and military actions witnessed by Reed. Rather, this book is an ant's-eye-view of the conflict, with vivid descriptions of the people, places, and events that Reed saw while in Mexico. The people, both soldiers and civilians, are mostly peasants- earthy, lusty people who live life to the hilt, and the soldiers especially are newly emboldened and brimming with confidence as a result of the revolution. The places, since Reed mostly saw Chihuahua and northern Durango, recently ravaged by passing armies, are dusty, and filled with mesquite and coyotes, with intermittent burned-out manors and clusters of peasants' huts. The events are, since this was a war, often violent and abrupt. It is a fascinating world to read about, but probably not one you'd want to live in- Reed does not focus on, but neither does he shy away from, describing the death and mutilation resulting from the battles he is near.
Among all this are profiles of the two men occupying leading positions in the revolution in the north: Pancho Villa and Venustiano Carranza. Villa comes across as the epitome of all the other soldiers Reed describes- he loves dancing, women, and fighting; he has a boisterous sense of humor; he disdains ceremony, and believes deeply and sincerely in the ideals he is fighting for, even if those ideals are not entirely clear. Carranza comes across as a rather confused, fragile, ineffectual old man, access to whom is controlled by his advisors and ministers, with the implication that he might be a puppet for these other men. He's clearly far more conservative and old-fashioned than Villa, and out of touch with the desires of the common people. Reed had left Mexico by the time Huerta was defeated, and Carranza and Villa fell out, so that later stage of the revolution is not covered, but the seeds of that future conflict are clearly here.
Among all this are profiles of the two men occupying leading positions in the revolution in the north: Pancho Villa and Venustiano Carranza. Villa comes across as the epitome of all the other soldiers Reed describes- he loves dancing, women, and fighting; he has a boisterous sense of humor; he disdains ceremony, and believes deeply and sincerely in the ideals he is fighting for, even if those ideals are not entirely clear. Carranza comes across as a rather confused, fragile, ineffectual old man, access to whom is controlled by his advisors and ministers, with the implication that he might be a puppet for these other men. He's clearly far more conservative and old-fashioned than Villa, and out of touch with the desires of the common people. Reed had left Mexico by the time Huerta was defeated, and Carranza and Villa fell out, so that later stage of the revolution is not covered, but the seeds of that future conflict are clearly here.
May 10, 2020
If "Homage to Catalonia" left you hungry for another blend of adventure, true war reporting, headache-inducing factionalism, romanticized socialism, and oddly-rendered Spanish translations -- boy do I have a book for you!
John Reed is the kind of writer whose life eventually became a more intriguing story than his works, and it's easy to see why. Here, at the beginning of his career, the famously revolutionary reporter has managed to somehow embed himself in Pancho Villa's militia, sharing the dangers and hardships of an increasingly confusing war. The book, which takes the form of a series of impressionistic vignettes of marches, battles, scenes of Mexican peasant life, and wartime camaraderie, seems cobbled together from Reed's dispatches, written in sweepingly romantic and vivid language. "Insurgent Mexico" is at its strongest when Reed focuses on the stories, motivations, and relationships of the individual soldiers in Villa's army whom he befriends along the way.
Where "Insurgent Mexico" falls short is wherever Reed insists on seeing the war around him through the lens of his own ideology and idealism. Reed tries so hard to turn Pancho Villa -- a complex, anachronistic, not-always-heroic figure -- into a paragon of proto-socialist revolutionary virtue. And he seems to refuse to see the narrative around him in any other terms.
This is where the comparison to "Homage to Catalonia" fails: what makes that book great is the sub-story of how Orwell eventually becomes disillusioned with the ideals that led him into the conflict. Reed, on the other hand, seems stubbornly incapable of disillusionment.
Reed's descriptions of Mexico also tend to range from the poetically romantic to the patronizingly romantic. If you can forgive him for that, you're left with his sense of earnest enthusiasm and energetic writing that makes for an enjoyable adventure.
John Reed is the kind of writer whose life eventually became a more intriguing story than his works, and it's easy to see why. Here, at the beginning of his career, the famously revolutionary reporter has managed to somehow embed himself in Pancho Villa's militia, sharing the dangers and hardships of an increasingly confusing war. The book, which takes the form of a series of impressionistic vignettes of marches, battles, scenes of Mexican peasant life, and wartime camaraderie, seems cobbled together from Reed's dispatches, written in sweepingly romantic and vivid language. "Insurgent Mexico" is at its strongest when Reed focuses on the stories, motivations, and relationships of the individual soldiers in Villa's army whom he befriends along the way.
Where "Insurgent Mexico" falls short is wherever Reed insists on seeing the war around him through the lens of his own ideology and idealism. Reed tries so hard to turn Pancho Villa -- a complex, anachronistic, not-always-heroic figure -- into a paragon of proto-socialist revolutionary virtue. And he seems to refuse to see the narrative around him in any other terms.
This is where the comparison to "Homage to Catalonia" fails: what makes that book great is the sub-story of how Orwell eventually becomes disillusioned with the ideals that led him into the conflict. Reed, on the other hand, seems stubbornly incapable of disillusionment.
Reed's descriptions of Mexico also tend to range from the poetically romantic to the patronizingly romantic. If you can forgive him for that, you're left with his sense of earnest enthusiasm and energetic writing that makes for an enjoyable adventure.
September 16, 2025
And of all a sudden, I’m an American journalist marching with the Constitutionalist army, devoured by thirst during long rides in the desert, discussing, singing, dancing, drinking arguadiente and other ominously strong liquors with my compañeros, and painfully losing them to Colorados and Federalists assaults.
Reed navigates 1910s Mexico with his ever-questioning eyes, and brings us along.
The portrait of the Northern Mexican revolutionaries is mesmerising.
His miraculous escape during the tragic La Cadena attack by the Colorados is certainly the highest point of the narration (and surely of his Mexican journey).
Reed navigates 1910s Mexico with his ever-questioning eyes, and brings us along.
The portrait of the Northern Mexican revolutionaries is mesmerising.
His miraculous escape during the tragic La Cadena attack by the Colorados is certainly the highest point of the narration (and surely of his Mexican journey).
September 22, 2025
La Revolución Mexicana (1910-1920) definió el México que conocemos hoy en día. Trajo consigo el fin de la dictadura de Porfirio Díaz y más de un millón de muertos.
A principios de esta, el legendario reportero estadounidense John Reed comenzó sus andanzas como corresponsal de guerra dentro del bando revolucionario. Durante su tiempo en México, Reed se empapó de las tradiciones y la cultura del pueblo mexicano, y sobre todo del fervor revolucionario. Mantuvo una relación cercana con el también legendario Pancho Villa, a quien al igual que al mexicano corriente retrata con cariño y aprecio. En el libro se aprecia ya su incipiente ideología social-comunista, influida por las ideas de Villa, partidario de la expropiación de tierras de los grandes hacendados y de un Estado mexicano menos militarizado.
Esta inmersión en la vida cotidiana de los soldados y campesinos permite conocer una parte de la Revolución Mexicana de forma íntima. Pero quizá aquí reside mi única crítica, aunque tal vez sea un poco injusta: este libro no te permite entender del todo la revolución. Aunque conozcas a Pancho Villa, falta contexto: ¿cuándo empezó esta guerra?, ¿quién fue Porfirio Díaz?, ¿y Venustiano Carranza? Pero, ¿realmente pretende este libro ofrecer ese contexto?
Gran libro y muy recomendable. Además, la edición de Capitán Swing incluye unas ilustraciones preciosas.
"Canten jilgueros y sinsontes sin parar
Y que sus trinos se oigan en la serranía
Y cuando vuelen bajo el cielo de Parral
Lloren conmigo por el gran Francisco Villa."
Antonio Aguilar
A principios de esta, el legendario reportero estadounidense John Reed comenzó sus andanzas como corresponsal de guerra dentro del bando revolucionario. Durante su tiempo en México, Reed se empapó de las tradiciones y la cultura del pueblo mexicano, y sobre todo del fervor revolucionario. Mantuvo una relación cercana con el también legendario Pancho Villa, a quien al igual que al mexicano corriente retrata con cariño y aprecio. En el libro se aprecia ya su incipiente ideología social-comunista, influida por las ideas de Villa, partidario de la expropiación de tierras de los grandes hacendados y de un Estado mexicano menos militarizado.
Esta inmersión en la vida cotidiana de los soldados y campesinos permite conocer una parte de la Revolución Mexicana de forma íntima. Pero quizá aquí reside mi única crítica, aunque tal vez sea un poco injusta: este libro no te permite entender del todo la revolución. Aunque conozcas a Pancho Villa, falta contexto: ¿cuándo empezó esta guerra?, ¿quién fue Porfirio Díaz?, ¿y Venustiano Carranza? Pero, ¿realmente pretende este libro ofrecer ese contexto?
Gran libro y muy recomendable. Además, la edición de Capitán Swing incluye unas ilustraciones preciosas.
"Canten jilgueros y sinsontes sin parar
Y que sus trinos se oigan en la serranía
Y cuando vuelen bajo el cielo de Parral
Lloren conmigo por el gran Francisco Villa."
Antonio Aguilar
July 23, 2025
Edebi gazetecilik formları ile edebiyat sınırlarında gezen bir eser. Eğer birincil kaynaktan bir dönem tanıklığı istiyorsanız oldukça ilgi çekici ancak devrimin doğasını anlamak için yeterli değil. Öte yandan, Meksika Devrimi'nin önemli figürlerinin özellikle de Pancho Villa'nın kişiliği, savaşı filtresiz biçimde ve "Anayasacılar" tarafından olabildiğince iyi biçimde aktarılmış olması, Meksika halkının özellikle topraksız köylünün durumunu aktarma biçimiyle öne çıkan bir kitap.
Dönem ile ilgili olanların ve birincil tanıklıkları okumak isteyenlerin hoşuna gideceğine inanıyorum.
Dönem ile ilgili olanların ve birincil tanıklıkları okumak isteyenlerin hoşuna gideceğine inanıyorum.
September 6, 2025
Compilado de crónicas de Jhon Reed de norte de México en revolución, en el periodo de lucha de los constitucionalistas contra la dictadura de Huerta. Grata lectura de los pormenores del ejército del Norte. Tremenda descripción de la figura de Pancho Villa y su vínculo con su ejército. Y en general, sorprendentes descripciones del pueblo mexicano en revolución. Excelente para aproximarse un poco a la revolución mexicana y conocer un poco más de este país y sus gentes.
June 22, 2018
I never bothered reading any of John Read due to his communist reputation, but Insurgent Mexico. (D. Appleton & Co., New York 1914) written over 100 years ago is a fascinating and engaging narrative as some of today's best literary fiction by the likes of Cormac McCarthy, Boston Teran or Philipp Meyer. His description of the savage revolution and brutal landscape is almost poetic. Reading such a well-written eye witness account of History is exciting and captivating. Tragically Mexico is still a failed state wrecked by violence, just this weekend I've read reports of 114 political assassinations and the murder of 3 journalists in the last six months.
If you're wondering why illegal immigration from Mexico continues to be such an immense problem, all you need to understand is the plight of the peons / peasants that Read describes. Insurgent Mexico is about a revolution that occurred over almost a hundred and twenty years ago whose legacy is still felt by the people of Mexico, who suffer from the same maladies as they did over a hundred years ago. John Read’s social commentary and description of comrade camaraderie is still relevant today.
If you're wondering why illegal immigration from Mexico continues to be such an immense problem, all you need to understand is the plight of the peons / peasants that Read describes. Insurgent Mexico is about a revolution that occurred over almost a hundred and twenty years ago whose legacy is still felt by the people of Mexico, who suffer from the same maladies as they did over a hundred years ago. John Read’s social commentary and description of comrade camaraderie is still relevant today.
August 3, 2021
Interesting series of accounts
This edition has a lot of typographical errors which can at times make reading difficult. Overall its an interesting read, its essentially a series of diary entries so its not very useful for plotting the military campaigns of the Revolution or the wider political context. But on the otherhand it is an excellent introduction to several Mexican revolutionaries as human beings rather than icons.
From ex-peon irregulars up to Pancho Villa and Caranza. In particular I found the account of Reed's sole meeting with Caranza fascinating, for the first time I've seen evidence of the turbulent emotions the cold and calculating Constitutionalist leader posessed.
This edition has a lot of typographical errors which can at times make reading difficult. Overall its an interesting read, its essentially a series of diary entries so its not very useful for plotting the military campaigns of the Revolution or the wider political context. But on the otherhand it is an excellent introduction to several Mexican revolutionaries as human beings rather than icons.
From ex-peon irregulars up to Pancho Villa and Caranza. In particular I found the account of Reed's sole meeting with Caranza fascinating, for the first time I've seen evidence of the turbulent emotions the cold and calculating Constitutionalist leader posessed.
August 9, 2021
Una genialidad absoluta para quienes gustan de la crónica periodística y la historia de México. La desmitificación de una figura tan emblemática como lo es Francisco Villa es lo más interesante, en definitiva; sin embargo también guarda muchas anécdotas y realidades antiquísimas que hemos ido arrastrando y adaptando a los tiempos modernos de nuestra sociedad.
México insurgente es una lectura cruda que nos recuerda dónde estamos parados, y que muchas de las convenciones sociales que tenemos hoy en el país, son el resultado de años de costumbres y tradiciones replicadas hasta olvidar su origen.
México insurgente es una lectura cruda que nos recuerda dónde estamos parados, y que muchas de las convenciones sociales que tenemos hoy en el país, son el resultado de años de costumbres y tradiciones replicadas hasta olvidar su origen.
April 5, 2013
American socialist and journalist John Reed traveled to Mexico to cover the Revolution and his reportage is a vivid eye witnesses account. He met Pancho Vila and rode with his troops. Reed covered the battles, but most important of all, he captured the people who fought the Revolution. He lived with them and traveled with them. This is the book to read if ever you had an interest in the Mexican Revolution...
April 9, 2020
Reed's descriptions of the revolution, fought in Mexico's northern desert, puts you right in the saddle riding with Pancho Villa and his men. The rough, patchy reportage, which reads more like field notes than a finished manuscript, only lends to the authenticity.
November 22, 2020
Riveting journalism.
April 30, 2017
Lo compré el año pasado en la feria del libro de la ciudad, en el estanco de una librería vasca especializada en temas libertarios (no confundir con liberalismo -económico-, nada más opuesto).
John Reed comenzó a
rondar mi consciencia cuando me enteré que él era uno de los dos norteamericanos enterrados en la Necrópolis de la Muralla del Kremlin. Fue una sorpresa para mi enterarme que hay norteamericanos enterrados allí, allende al mausoleo de Lenin, el hombre de la Revolución Bolchevique.
La vida de Reed es inspiradora hasta la envidia. Algunos trazos de ella pueden verse en la película de 1981, Reds, que fue otra sorpresa: una película sobre comunistas en EEUU, producida durante el fragor de la contra-revolución capitalista, bajo la égida de Margaret Thatcher y Ronald Reagan, a la postre dominante en el planeta entero.
El trabajo periodístico que catapultó a Reed fue la presente obra sobre la Revolución mexicana. Un día marchó hacia la frontera con México, para encontrarse con las tropas del ya entonces mítico Pancho Villa. Peleaban contra los pelones, el ejército Federal, dirigidos por el general golpista Victoriano Huerta. Villa luchaba de lado de los Constitucionalistas, antiguos partidarios de Francisco I. Madero, cuyo objetivo inicial fue defenestrar al dictador Porfirio Díaz. Ganada la revuelta y Madero investido presidente, estos viejos partidarios no consintieron su ulterior asesinato a manos de su Ministro de Guerra, el susodicho Victoriano Huerta.
Huerta, a final de cuentas, era un simple sustituto de Díaz a los ojos de los gringos y otras potencias europeas, para así continuar con sus privilegios coloniales. Huerta era la negación misma del alzamiento encabezado por Madero, un claro ejemplo de las fuerzas reaccionarias en toda revolución.
Desde la presidencia de Salinas de Gortari y la imposición de las políticas neoliberales, hace más de 30 años, ha habido una insistencia por parte de los intelectuales orgánicos al poder, como Enrique Krauze, en recuperar la imagen de Porfirio Díaz como abuelito paternal que trajo progreso a la nación. Omiten, cizañosamente, los crímenes de lesa humanidad que cometió Díaz en nombre de dicho progreso. Basta recordar el genocidio de los pueblos Yaqui y Maya. El progreso cuando se impone es mero colonialismo.
La tropa llamaba a Reed el míster y ganaba su corazón con facilidad. Reed estaba constantemente asombrado por la simultanea docilidad del mexicano humilde, a la vez fiero en el combate y bravucón en el festejo. Se mantuvo lejos de chupatintas, letrados y políticos rastreros, hasta de sus colegas, los corresponsales de guerra. En cambio bebía sotol, dormía encobijado entre
piojos y chinches, compartía tortillas con chile, bailaba con las mujeres que acompañaban a la tropa. No tenía duda alguna de su perspectiva, estaba políticamente posicionado. Consciencia de clase, le llaman. No presumía de objetividad y demás imbecilidades que se dicen para ocultar la sumisión al
poder explotador.
El estilo narrativo de Reed ha sido aleccionador para mi. No reflexiona, ni hace ensayo, ni filosofía abstracta. Únicamente describe escenas, narra los hechos que presenció. Pero no de cualquier manera, hay un mensaje en estas escenas, el orden en que las narra, la palabras de sus interlocutores, la intensidad. En términos nietzschianos, da preferencia a lo vivido (lo dionisiaco) sobre lo sabido (lo apolíneo). La complejidad de lo concreto, de lo material, lo existente, que, finalmente, es lo que confirma o no las hipótesis, las teorías que fabulamos.
Cuando Reed encuentra a Villa, quien rápidamente lo apodó el chatito, Reed encuentra en él una figura refulgente. Se comporta como niño hiperactivo, no fumaba ni bebía. Bailaba día y noche. No se perdía ninguna corrida de toros.
[…] Cuando sólo era un muchacho de dieciséis, repartiendo leche en las calles de Chihuahua, mató a un funcionario del Gobierno y se echó al monte. Se dice que el funcionario en cuestión había violado a su hermana, pero lo más probable que la causa hubiera sido la insoportable altanería de Villa
Villa fue absolutamente fiel a Madero y a su causa. Fue fiel a Venustiano Carranza mientras abanderó la causa maderista. Cuando Carranza, dibujado por Reed como un ser oscuro, mórbido, vampiresco, traiciona la causa agraria y campesina de la revolución, para trocarla en una revuelta burguesa más, Villa se levanta en su contra. Pero algo bueno tenía Carranza: era anti-imperialista. Supo mantener a raya los apetitos de EEUU e Inglaterra. Al contrario de Porfirio Díaz, Carranza buscaba el desarrollo de una burguesía nacional.
Hay una escena maravillosa con Villa reunido con sus consejeros, discutiendo la manera de financiar la revolución.
[…] proponían financiar la revolución emitiendo bonos del Estado que redituaran al 30 o 40% de interés. Villa manifestó:
—Entiendo que el Estado deba pagar algo al pueblo por el empleo de su dinero, pero ¿cómo puede ser justo que le sea devuelto éste triplicado o cuadruplicado?
No podía admitir que se adjudicaran grandes exensiones de tierra a los ricos y no a los pobres. Toda la compleja estructura de la civilización era nueva para él. Había que ser filósofo para explicar cualquier cosa a Villa: sus consejeros sólo eran hombres prácticos.
Tecnócratas se llaman ahora. Gente que en nombre del pragmatismo matan por omisión a miles de personas de hambre, enfermedad, por crímenes o accidentes. Villa estaba lo cierto: hace falta filosofía para tomar decisiones de Estado.
Una digresión. Con ascensión de la cultura del narco en la sociedad mexicana, una frase se volvió de circulación corriente: ¡Fierro, pariente!. Que significa algo así como «vamos darlo todo, compañero», pero está más asociado al sicario que anima al asesinato de alguien. El lenguaje es dúctil y la historia pesa. Me pregunto sí la frase podría relacionarse inconscientemente con Rodolfo Fierro, mano derecha y amigo íntimo de Pancho Villa:
[…] Fierro, el apuesto, duro y altanero, a quien llamaban El Carnicero por que mataba a sus prisioneros indefensos personalmente, lo mismo que a sus propios hombres, sin provocación alguna.
La historia pesa y se repite.
El papel de la mujer en la revolución no está ausente en el texto de Reed, y aunque secundario, no es marginal. Las adelitas, mujeres que acompañan a la tropa, luchando en el frente, pero sobre todo formando parte de la estructura de la logística militar, con provisionamiento de alimento para los soldados. Acampaban allende la vía del tren y se las ingeniaban para conseguir
maíz y preparar el fuego para que sus parejas tengan algo que llevarse a la boca.
Al igual que Frantz Fanon, quien hace un análisis de los cambios en la estructura familiar y de pareja durante la guerra de Argelia, Reed ofrece pinceladas sobre este tema en la revolución: hay carencia de protocolos y pretensiones románticas. La relación de pareja es un instrumento de supervivencia en un medio hostil. El capitulo sobre Isabel me impactó, la chica indígena cuyo hombre recién muerto en la escaramuza previa, luego "tomada" por un teniente desagradable y violento, le pide a Reed que duerma con ella esa noche, ya que le es insoportable la mera imagen del teniente. Me impactó sobre todo por el giro en la actitud de Isabel: primero rebelde y determinada, al día siguiente sumisa, resignada al hombre que la "tomó". También Doña Luisa, la gringa de Nueva Inglaterra, dueña de un hotel decrépito en la ciudad de Jiménez, quien plantó cara al traidor Pascual Orozco y al mismísmo Rodolfo Fierro.
Otro escena relacionada es cuando Reed hace ver a Villa que las mujeres son igual de aptas para tomar decisiones de guerra y que pueden ser aún más despiadadas que un hombre.
[…] Miró despacio hacia donde su mujer ponía la mesa para almorzar.
—Oiga —exclamó—, venga acá. Escuche. Anoche sorprendí a tres traidores cruzando el río para volar la vía del ferrocarril. ¿Qué haré con ellos? ¿Los fusilaré o no?
Toda turbada, ella tomó su mano y la besó.
—Oh, yo no sé nada acerca de eso —dijo ella—. Tú sabes más.
—No —dijo Villa—. Lo dejo completamente a tu juicio. Estos hombres trataban de cortar nuestras comunicaciones entre Juárez y Chihuaha. Eran traidores, federales. ¿Qué haré? ¿Los debo fusilar o no?
—Oh, bueno, fusílalos —contestó la señora Villa.
Es indiscutible que el machismo es patente e invade todas las estructuras sociales en México, ayer y hoy. Ya es hora de quitarnos ese lastre de encima.
El punto más álgido de la obra es con la toma de Torreón por parte del ejército Constitucionalista, dirigido por Pancho Villa. Batalla decisiva que desemboca en el derrocamiento y posterior huida de Victoriano Huerta.
Al igual que muchos, supongo, dada mi mediocre educación en historia de México, yo argumentaba que la Revolución había sido una gran sinsentido, sin ningún tipo de ideología detrás. Rozaba el discurso de la derecha a favor del porfiriato. Por suerte, he podido replantearme esa mentalidad facilona y hegemónica. No puedo dejar de recomendar este episodio, del programa de
televisión «Filosofía aquí y ahora», del pensador argentino Pablo Feinmann, sobre la Revolución Mexicana, a pesar de sus erratas e imprecisiones toponímicas e históricas.
Un último apunte a propósito del programa de Feinmann. Coincido con él, al igual que con muchos pensadores a ambos lados de espectro, que la Revolución mexicana fue llevada a cabo por caudillos, líderes y militares excepcionales. Y la población que los seguía, los adoraba. Pero jamás hubo un proceso, realmente revolucionario, de transferir el poder, de unas cuantas manos, a las masas, la construcción del poder popular. Esa adoración al líder, de la que tanto se mofan con la dinastía Kim de norcorea, o Hugo Chávez, o hasta López Obrador, es la misma que reproducen con los Kennedy, Christine Lagarde, o los nefastos Luis Videgaray y Pedro Aspe.
April 11, 2024
No recuerdo cómo este libro llegó a mi manos (que lo sujetan con fuerza para que sus tripas no se desparramen por todo el teclado). Pensaba que tal vez podía haberlo comprado en la famosa plataforma web de venta de libros de segunda mano online al que acudía con cierta frecuencia hace unos años. Fui a comprobarlo, y no lo hallé. No me quedó más remedio que construirme una ficción: era un día de primavera, el Sol parecía desperezarse por fin y las engreídas Nubes asturianas se apartaban con mala cara. Tras una jornada de Universidad más o menos aprovechada, me bajo como siempre en mi parada de autobús frente a la Iglesia de Carmelitas, y decido realizar mi paseo semanal por la tienda de segunda mano que me hizo en su día romper la hucha para adquirir esa antología de textos marxistas editados en la Unión Soviética. A la sazón, justamente acababa de leer con gozo aquella obra recomendada por todos los marxistas de internet que prometía acercarte a la revolución bolchevique y a la toma del Palacio de Invierno desde los ojos de un corresponsal de guerra yankee. «¡John Reed!», ahí estaba su nombre. «¿"México insurgente"? ¿Insurgencia? ¿Rebeldía? ¿Revolución?». Palabras que me gustaban mucho en aquel momento y que me gustan más ahora que las entiendo mejor. «¿Cuánto es?». Cuando llego a casa, lo coloco un momento encima de todos esos otros libros de segunda mano que esperan pacientes su limpieza y limado de las manchas que oscurecen su canto.
El libro es una maravilla: escrito con una belleza terrenal que te sublima. El autor nos acerca a la revolución mexicana de principios del siglo XX, pero no desde la Historia, ni siquiera desde la crónica. Su acercamiento es puramente poético: desde el verbo nos descubre la miseria de los peones mexicanos que sentían la injusticia que padecían antes incluso de poder pensarla con claridad. «El socialismo, ¿es alguna cosa posible?», se pregunta el peón revolucionario Pancho Villa fascinado por descubrir las nuevas ideas a las que tiene acceso gracias a su recién aprendido arte de la lectura.
¡Qué acertado estuvo el Marlon de hace unos años al traerme este libro!
El libro es una maravilla: escrito con una belleza terrenal que te sublima. El autor nos acerca a la revolución mexicana de principios del siglo XX, pero no desde la Historia, ni siquiera desde la crónica. Su acercamiento es puramente poético: desde el verbo nos descubre la miseria de los peones mexicanos que sentían la injusticia que padecían antes incluso de poder pensarla con claridad. «El socialismo, ¿es alguna cosa posible?», se pregunta el peón revolucionario Pancho Villa fascinado por descubrir las nuevas ideas a las que tiene acceso gracias a su recién aprendido arte de la lectura.
¡Qué acertado estuvo el Marlon de hace unos años al traerme este libro!
May 3, 2025
Most famous for his eye-witness account of the October Revolution in Russia, John Reed had earlier cut his teeth as one of the early war correspondents in Mexico. Embedded with the Villistas in Northern Mexico, Reed got to know a whole host of larger-than-life characters including Pancho Villa himself, and was a witness to the battle of Torreon. His account of the Mexican Revolution is in many ways like the great murals of the Revolution- impressions of revolutionary ardor and spirit through vast hosts of characters and the Mexican landscape. There is a decidedly romantic tone to Reed's writing, reflecting both his personal revolutionary politics as well as an American fantasy of Mexico as a place where the adventure of the frontier was not yet foreclosed. Reed extols the character of the Mexican peon, who is generous and hospitable despite owning nothing, yet who is also depicted as fiery, short-tempered, and governed by passions rather than rationality. There is some truly beautiful prose: "It was an incredible dream, through which the grotesque procession of wounded filtered like ghosts in the dust;" "The romance of gold hangs over the mountains of northern Durango like an old perfume..." Some might be put off by this flowery language overtaking the factual reporting, but you have to take it as an impression rather than a definitive history of the Mexican Revolution.
August 7, 2025
Remember that scene in REDS where Warren Beatty, in some unidentified dusty Third World country, chases after an armed vehicle just in front of him and finally catches up? That's John ("Jack") Reed, the original Gonzo journalist, long before Hunter S. Thompson. Throwing aside all pretense of objectivity Reed wandered down Mexico way in search of peasant revolutionary and sometime bandit Pancho Villa, making his contribution to the Mexican Revolution of 1910, joining him and his men in many an escapade, from looting haciendas to not so politically correct times with the senoritas. INSURGENT MEXICO is Jack's report back on the Revolution, Villa and himself, not necessarily in that order. Jack tried to frame Villa in the contours of some ideology, anarchist, socialist, Robinhoodism, but failed and gave up. Villa was a man of the bullet, not the brain. The interviews with Pancho and his wild boys in this volume are the stuff of history in the furnace. These adventures still make for exciting reading, and deepen our understanding of conflicts, and American reporting of wars and revolutions, in Latin America, Africa and Asia today.
February 21, 2025
John Reed's first-hand account of living alongside troops in the Mexican Revolution shows the many different faces of the revolution-- the peons who join, the women who follow them, the American mercenaries, and the many different military factions with competing interests. The most interesting part of this book is every interaction with Pancho Villa, a unique character with a tough, grassroots leadership style forged by his experience as an outlaw in the countryside. Reed shows how Villa, with little formal education, uses his street smarts to win military battles and remake the local financial system in his favor. However, Villa's lack of formal education is also the bane of the revolution, as he cedes much of the most important decision-making to and out-of-touch political class that Reed visits towards the end of the book.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 12, 2025
This was an interesting book written by an American journalist who was in Mexico and traveling with soldiers as the revolution was going on. Though Reed doesn't speak much Spanish, he manages to paint a fairly complex picture of the wide variety of Mexican people he comes in contact with. I also think that Reed portrayal is sympathetic, though he sometimes falls into simply reporting long-held stereotypes. The ending of the book is the by far the weakest part; it honestly has me wondering if Reed meant to write more, but was forced by circumstances to simply terminate this account.
December 8, 2024
Es un libro precioso y detallado. Lo compré para saber del EZLN, pero me lleve sorpresas hermosas y descripciones lúcidas de los soldados revolucionarios. Hubieron párrafos que me emocionaron muchísimo, y otros que me aburrieron al mismo nivel. Pero puede ser porque no fantaseo a menudo con la historia.
October 26, 2025
After the first few chapters, I realized I needed to pause the book for a quick lesson what what the Mexican Revolution was about. John Reed was an American reporter who traveled with Pancho Villa’s army, and even got to know Pancho Villa personally. Part of the book was a fun travel back into the past, but other parts just seemed so irrelevant today.
October 22, 2023
Crónicas de la revolución mexicana contadas de una forma muy fluida y concreta. En este libro también podemos entender y darnos una idea de lo que pasaba antes, durante y después de un enfrentamiento.
January 1, 2025
John Reed är förmodligen min favoritjournalist någonsin. Alla reportage här - en samling 1914-1919, namngiven efter Mexiko men innehåller också skildringar från USA och Östeuropa - är 5/5. Enda anledningen till fyra stjärnor är att jag önskar den innehöll fler så man fick dyka djupare.
August 5, 2020
Un libro muy interesante, que te muestra como era México durante el Porfiriato
August 4, 2023
Proper journalism, streets ahead of Homage to Catalonia 👍
February 11, 2025
Good primary account of Pancho Villa during the Mexican Revolution in the North/Chihuahua. Read "Ten Days that Shook the World"
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