Customer Reviews

The Mexican Revolution. Volume 1: Porfirians, Liberals, and Peasants (Cambridge Latin American Studies)

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This two-volume history of the Mexican Revolution is absolutely packed with case studies and individual narratives. Knight's vision is one of many and various Mexicos, all of which experienced a different revolution. Far from being simply to entertain, the role of a history text is to explain what happened. Knight puts forward a strong, if not universally accepted, case for the dismissal of grand theories of a single process, instead arguing that the revolution meant one thing to the generals of the north, quite another to the peasants of the centre, and very little to (for example) the Indians of the south. The reader may feel confused by the book; there is nothing wrong with such an outcome - it was a confusing period of history during which few people knew what was happening and with what likely effect.

This two volume book on the Mexican Revolution is massive, and for twenty years now it has stood as one of the most important works on the Mexican Revolution. Knight's research is exhaustive, and his writing style is unique with an impressive command of the English language. The work weaves between narrative and analysis, and the reader is always kept aware of the historiography of the Mexican Revolution, which is still a contentious theme in Mexican history almost one hundred years now after the Revolution. Knight's work is definitive and should be read by any serious student of the greats events of the twentieth century.

This book totally defies history's number one precept which is to entertain. Knight follows a random course through the Mexican Revolution digressing into such inane topics as the difference between a revolution and rebellion, or the difference between social and criminal banditry. Furthermore, he bogs down in trying to classify the different parts of the revolution as revolutionary or counterrevolutionary basically coming to the conclusion that the revolution was caudillismo on a grand scale where ideologies are overwhelmed by personal vendettas and disagreements between pueblos that go back to antiquity.
Knight finally finishes up with two main assertions that are neither enlightening nor cogent. The first is his characterization of the war as a struggle between mountaineers and lowlanders. The second is that the conventionist forces were regionalists versus the constitutionalists who advocated a strong central government. Merely characterizing the opponents is supposed to suffice for analyis. There is nothing here to suggest a paradigm for future or contemporary revolutions, nor to provide real insight in the Mexican Revolution itself. It's wholly academic and sterile.
This book contains many vignettes and examples to support Knight's "theories", but it is altogether not a good overview of the war.
I would recommend this book to a student of the revolution, already well versed who wants to gain some new information.