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The outline presents my broad ideas for
the novel. Some major players will surely be as depicted here:
Iuitl, the Woman of Tepexpan; Ozomatli, Blood Serpent, the
Aztec; Pascual Zavala, the conquistador; Jacinta Romero, the
wagonmaster's daughter; Vicente Zavala, the artist of revolution;
Serilda and Guadalupe Cruz and Delia Zavala, soldadera
in today's frontlines. Many others I've yet to meet
wait off-stage. Many story suggestions will stand as presented,
others will evolve as part of the bigger picture only
my characters can reveal.
I bring to Mexico, the same talents
that mastered the story of Brazil: “ Uys
has accomplished what no Brazilian author from José
de Alencar to Jorge Amado was able to do. He is the first
to write our national epic in all its decisive episodes, from
the indigenous civilization and the El Dorado myth, everything
converging like the segments of a rose window to that reborn
and metamorphosed myth that is Brasilia. He is the first outsider
to see us with total honesty and sympathy and full empathy
with the decisive moments in our history and their spiritual
meaning. Descriptions like those of the war with Paraguay
are unsurpassed in our literature and evoke the great passages
of War and Peace. ”
One reason I chose Brazil as my subject
was the lack of knowledge I found among Americans about their
biggest neighbor in the hemisphere. Perceptions of Mexico
are similarly driven by xenophobic interpretations of history
that afford the Mexican past neither respect nor honor. As
an immigrant myself coming from a country scarred by racism,
I am appalled by the mean-spirited prejudice toward Mexicans,
the stereotypes and simplifications. I tell the epic story
of Mexico's people with my eyes wide open, my mind thrilling
to the swashbuckling moments and pausing, too, to see Mexico
with total honesty and sympathy and full empathy.
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