Las luchas por la independencia en la literatura mexicana
The battles of independence in Mexican literature

Summary/Abstract: Since the last century, Mexican literature has documented extensively all mayor historical events: the 1910 Revolution, the Cristero war in the 1920s, the urban guerrilla movements of the 60s and 70s, the drug cartels confrontations of present day... it is therefore interesting to reflect on the fact that the Independence War, long and bloody as it was, did not have a significant writer or a poet or record it. The first published novel set in this period is Los pasos de López, by Jorge Ibargüengoitia, printed in 1982. In a satiric way, it tells the story of father Miguel Hidalgo, “The Father of the Homeland”, and other historical characters, changing their names. Later, in 1991, Carlos Fuentes published La campaña, a historical mosaic of Latin American struggles for independence. In 1995, Rosa Beltrán published La corte de los ilusos, another satirical novel, about the life and death of the only Mexican emperor, don Agustín de Iturbide. In 1999, Enrique Serna published El seductor de la patria, a biographical novel about the general, president and dictator, Antonio López de Santa Ana. Finally, the last decade witnessed the publication of Raquel Huerta’s El guerrero del alba, about the caudillo Vicente Guerrero. The Independence War of 1810 was not the only one in which Mexico had to fight for its independence. In fact, the French Intervention of 1862-1867 was another cross-roads in Mexican history, and it gave way to an even more copious literary production. In a similar way, other writers have documented in fiction and poetry all the other occasions in which Mexico has had to defend its independence.

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