Massacre in Mexico

by Elena Poniatowska

Now available in paperback is Elena Poniatowska's gripping account of the massacre of student protesters by police in Mexico City just days before the 1968 Olympic Games. Publishers Weekly describes this event as making "the campus killings at Kent State and Jackson State in 1970 pale by comparison."

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0826208177
• ISBN13: 9780826208170
• Release Date: December 1991
• Publisher: University of Missouri Press
• Length: 352 Pages
• Weight: 1.32 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 6.0" x 9.0"
• Age Range: 14 to 10 years
• Grade Range: Grades 9 to 5

Customer Reviews

HeartBreaking

The literature Massacre in Mexico is a unique kind of animal. It does not try to make the reader fall in love with a swooping storyline or care for any deep multi-faceted characters, as it is a collaboration of first-hand accounts of one of Mexico's most horrifying tragedies. It instead confuses and bewilders with details that contradict its own government statement regarding the horrors of October 1968 Student Movement massacre. Readers may be alarmed at Elena Poniatowaska's tone as it portrays the government as a body that rolls out conspiracies as easily as it would murder 325 of its unarmed civilians. The students attempted to peacefully demonstrate against nation's one-party government and lack of political freedom.

Book in Great Condition!

This is a book that is the closest one will get to the facts of what really happened in Tlatelolco on October 2, 1968.

Forty years later and it's not over...

If you are interested in Mexico, deeply interested, this is an important book by Elena Poniatowska, one of the country's most distinguished writers. Four decades later, in the midst of a bloody drug war rife with accusations of military human rights abuses, torture and assassinations, the questions surrounding the 1968 massacre at Tlatelolco persist.

interesting topic, but okay book

This is the best book I have found on this topic. However, the interviews get a little boring. I actually never made it to the end of the book because it was getting redundant. I would like someone to write about this topic in a more narrative form.

A thought-provoking account of the Tlatelolco massacre

Elena Poniatowska re-creates and recollects in this book the events leading up to, during, and after the massacre of civilians in the Plaza de las Tres Culturas, Mexico City, in October 1968. Divided into three parts, Poniatowska's book provides a fascinating insight into the general mood in Mexico City at the time. The author conducts a range of interviews with the students involved in the demonstrations and with their families and friends both before and after the event. Their voices are heard in the form of stories which tell the tale of Tlatelolco. Doctors, nurses, residents of the Plaza where the killing took place, servicemen and soldiers, all bear witness to an event which has up until recently, been obscured in Mexican history books. A compelling read.