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Title: Las Soldaderas: Women of the Mexican Revolution
ISBN: 1933693045
Author:
Elena Poniatowska
Publicate Date: 2006-11-01
Publish: 2006-11-01
List Price: $12.95
Average Customer Rating: 3.0
Format: Paperback
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $7.73
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $8.11
Amazon Merchant Price: $11.01
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| Customer Review: |
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1: Tribute to the brave women who were active participants in the Mexican Revolution
Elena Poniatowska's "Las Soldaderas: Women of the Mexican Revolution" (Cinco Puntos Press, $12.95 paperback) demonstrates the riveting, almost hypnotic power of photographs.
Poniatowska's text (translated from Spanish by David Dorado Romo) is wisely limited to about two dozen pages and acts as a frame for the remarkable black-and-white images of the brave women who fought on either side of the Mexican Revolution.
The term "soldadera" comes from "soldada," or salary. Poniatowska explains that "during all wars and invasions, soldiers used their 'soldada' (a word of Aragonese origin) to hire a female servant. The woman would go to the barracks to charge her salary, i.e., soldada." Thus, the term "soldadera" was coined.
The photographs are culled from the enormous Casasola Collection in the Fototeca Nacional of the National Institute of Anthropology and History in Mexico. The publisher tells us that the collection is based on the work of Agust??n Casasola (1874-1938), one of the first photojournalists in Mexico and founder of the photo agency that carries his name.
It is difficult not to mull over these photographs of Mexican and indigenous women from the early part of the last century as they pose with their pistols, horses, children or husbands. These are women who played different roles, sometimes as brave soldiers, other times as helpmates (or even prostitutes without much choice) to the male warriors.
Poniatowska offers anecdotes to help us know these women, sometimes using their own words. Pancho Villa does not fair well here, nor do other men who took brutal advantage of -- or even murdered -- these women.
"Las Soldaderas" perfectly weds words with photographs as a poignant tribute to the brave women who were active participants in the Mexican Revolution.
[The full review first appeared in the El Paso Times.]
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2: Waste of money !
The pages of the book are not even numbered correctly at the beginning of the story . The book is very thin, with only 89 pages (57 pages are of photographs, all of which are easily available on the internet for free, like on Pancho Villa's Photos website of Ojianga). Throughout the book, everything is so contradictory. The author seems confused. No real effort seems to have been put forth to educate the reader.Seems like she gave a bunch of jumbled reviews of different novels she picked up . You can't tell what is true and what is fiction. Can't believe this is supposed to be a book.
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