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<div class="header reader-header reader-show-element"> <a
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href="https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/books/story/2021-03-18/review-mexico-city-through-the-eyes-of-its-leading-novelist-flaneur">latimes.com</a>
<h1 class="reader-title">Review: Juan Villoro's "Horizontal
Vertigo" on Mexico City - Los Angeles Times</h1>
<div class="credits reader-credits">Rigoberto González</div>
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<div class="reader-estimated-time" dir="ltr">7-9 minutes</div>
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<p>On the Shelf</p>
<p>Horizontal Vertigo: A City Called Mexico</p>
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<p>By Juan Villoro, translated by Alfred MacAdam<br>
Pantheon: 368 pages, $30</p>
<p><i>If you buy books linked on our site, The Times may
earn a commission from <a
href="https://bookshop.org/a/7748/9781524748883"
target="_blank">Bookshop.org,</a> whose fees
support independent bookstores.</i></p>
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<p>In January 2016, Mexico’s capital, the Federal District,
officially changed its name to <a
href="https://www.latimes.com/food/story/2021-01-20/covid-19-is-crushing-mexico-citys-food-scene-and-the-culinary-energy-that-has-made-it-so-thrilling"
target="_blank">Mexico City</a>, though it had long been
called that. Short of becoming the 32nd state of the
nation, it is as close to a state as it can be, exercising
political autonomy and ratifying its own constitution.
Among the politicians and intellectuals enlisted to draft
this document was one of the country’s most celebrated
contemporary writers, <a
href="https://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-legendary-mexican-publishing-house-fce-celebrates-80th-birthday-20140904-story.html"
target="_blank">Juan Villoro</a>.</p>
<p>Born and raised in Mexico City, Villoro has been writing
about his beloved home for decades. “<a
href="https://bookshop.org/a/7748/9781524748883"
target="_blank">Horizontal Vertigo</a><b>: </b>A City
Called Mexico”<i> </i>gathers his most incisive essays,
chronicles and personal memories in an attempt to tackle a
singular challenge: How does one comprehend the most
populous city in North America, with<b> </b>its rich
history, complicated economy and multivalent culture? Each
person who experiences it<b> </b>has his or her own
interpretation of what the city is, and Villoro’s is as
striking as the iconic urban center.</p>
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<figure> <source type="image/webp"
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<p>(Victor Benitez / Pantheon)</p>
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<img class="image" alt="Men holding effigies ride the
metro in Mexico City after a commemoration."
src="https://ca-times.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/dd1b484/2147483647/strip/true/crop/3504x2336+0+0/resize/840x560!/quality/90/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcalifornia-times-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F78%2Fa4%2F36fae4684e2db5197441ade71bdf%2Fla-ca-bk-mexico-city-242.JPG"
width="840" height="560"> </figure>
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<p>Since the title refers to a sprawling landscape that
builds outward and not skyward, Villoro maintains a
ground-level view of what he calls “Chilangopolis” — <i><a
href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1987-10-31-mn-4446-story.html"
target="_blank">chilango</a></i> being the slang
demonym for a Mexico City resident. As a <i>chilango</i>,
he offers firsthand insights into a bittersweet mode of
life that many have come to accept, enjoy and even take
pride in. He delivers that reality, however, with
unabashed humor: “Our version of Popular Mechanics would
have to be called Popular Apocalypse,”<b> </b>he writes,
noting how <i>chilangos</i> have come to expect tragedies
like earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, along with
travesties like water shortages and pollution.</p>
<p>Though Villoro navigates such charged subjects as
poverty, nationalism and corruption, his writing comes
most alive when he highlights the assortment of Mexico
City icons (some famous, some unheralded heroes) in his
“City Characters” section. Here he profiles <a
href="https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/music/la-xpm-2013-mar-08-la-et-ms-paquita-la-del-barrio-honored-before-saturdays-nokia-concert-20130307-story.html"
target="_blank">Paquita la del Barrio</a>, whose brazen
songs “terminate once and for all the conventions of a
chaste Mexico” that shuns independent and sexually
liberated women. But also worthy of praise are the street
vendors and tire repairmen whose vulcanization stations
“stay open more in the manner of a cave than a business,”
because they’re a failing enterprise in a city where
supply exceeds demand. Villoro values that surplus in
human rather than economic terms. In Mexico City, “There
are a lot of us, but no one feels superfluous.”</p>
<p>Keeping a sympathetic eye focused on Mexico City’s
underdogs, Villoro includes a compelling portrait of <a
href="https://www.latimes.com/world/la-fg-c1-mexico-tepito-20140721-37-story.html"
target="_blank">Tepito</a>, a neighborhood demonized as
a haven for thieves and dealers of a variety of
contraband. Villoro instead calls it “a symbol of the
struggle to survive,” “a bastion of frenetic labor, except
that they work in a different way there.” He casts a
similar light on the street economy, the lifeblood of the
city, whose purveyors advertise their products with sound
— the whistle of the sweet potato cart and the distinctive
cries of the tamale seller as they zigzag through
residential areas.</p>
<p>Villoro’s compassion for the various groups that make up
his community infused his work on<b> </b>Mexico City’s
constitution. He took part in, among other issues, the
matter of cultural rights — protecting the traditions and
ceremonies of Indigenous and other ethnic groups — but the
constitution as a whole is renowned for its attention to
progressive issues involving the rights of women, the
LGBTQ community, strolling vendors and informal workers.</p>
<p>Villoro doesn’t delve too deeply into politics, but he
doesn’t miss a chance to criticize one specific leader.
The government of <a
href="https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-xpm-2012-apr-02-la-me-miguel-de-la-madrid-20120402-story.html"
target="_blank">Miguel de la Madrid</a>,<b> </b>president
during the 1985 earthquake, “was slow to ask for aid
because it did not want Mexico to be seen as a dangerous
place on the eve of the World Cup of 1986.” Like many
other residents who aided in grass-roots relief efforts,
Villoro has neither forgotten nor forgiven.</p>
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<figure> <source type="image/webp"
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<p>The specter of that natural disaster still hovers over
the city, particularly when other calamities also are
mismanaged. See “Diary of an Epidemic”: A chronicle of the
2009 <a
href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2009-apr-26-fg-mexico-swineflu26-story.html"
target="_blank">swine flu outbreak</a>, the essay offers
another harsh (and timely) lesson in how a government’s
ineptitude can jeopardize the well-being of its people
when they need it most. More deaths were recorded in
Mexico than in any other part of the world.</p>
<p>As a counterweight to the solemn pieces, Villoro includes
beguiling accounts on lighter topics, such as the
popularity of <a
href="https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2020-09-18/out-of-work-mexicos-luchadores-struggle-to-get-by"
target="_blank">lucha libre</a> wrestling. The
primordial fight between good and evil is appealing
because, in contrast to the complications of the real
world, the good guy always wins. And no one can resist the
theater of it all, complete with a villain whose “wages
are outrage; his bonus booing.”</p>
<p>Then there’s the widespread obsession with
extraterrestrial life. Villoro speculates that the popular
narrative of alien abduction for the purpose of cloning is
akin to “being given another destiny.” Abduction itself
“represents a personal transcendence.” And not to be
missed is the annual zombie march, “quite at home in
Chilangopolis.” Its philanthropic goal is to collect food
for the needy; therefore it’s an invasion of emissaries —
the living dead. All these fantasy narratives are
metaphors for the everyday paradoxes of Mexico City,
reality side by side with daydreams. A thick skin and a
lively imagination are necessary to survive. However,
Villoro asserts, “We [<i>chilangos</i>] like the city more
than we like the truth.”</p>
<p>Alfred MacAdam’s translation is generally superb, though
there is the occasional awkward word choice. The Mexican
boxer <a
href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2004-mar-04-sp-lopez4-story.html"
target="_blank">Jose “Mantequilla” Nápoles</a>, for
example, is translated to “Butter Nápoles” (which sounds
odd, particularly for those familiar with this
internationally renowned pugilist), and “humor blanco”
becomes “white humor,” which nowadays carries a markedly
different implication than “lighthearted humor.”
Thankfully, these instances are few and will be noticeable
only to bilingual readers.</p>
<div data-align-center="">
<figure> <source type="image/webp"
data-srcset="https://ca-times.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/185c180/2147483647/strip/true/crop/4928x3280+0+0/resize/320x213!/format/webp/quality/90/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcalifornia-times-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fca%2F4d%2Ff801b64046929375dd875a23b69d%2Fla-ca-bk-horizontal-vertigo-247.JPG
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840w" data-lazy-load="true"> </figure>
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<p>The joy of “Horizontal Vertigo”<i> </i>is that it offers
a unique entry into Mexico City’s “inexhaustible
encyclopedia” of people, places and old traditions,
complementing the history books and outperforming the tour
guides. Those expecting more personal stories about
Villoro himself will have to find them wandering among the
patriotic landmarks and the pirated music for sale on the
busy sidewalks: Villoro is so closely identified with
Mexico City that it’s impossible to imagine how one can be
known without the other, which is why his writings
consistently employ the communal “we,” as in this telling
statement about the unbreakable bond between Chilangopolis
and chilangos: “What was once a cityscape is now our
autobiography.”</p>
<p><i>González is a distinguished professor of English and
director of the MFA program in creative writing at
Rutgers-Newark, the State University of New Jersey.</i></p>
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