Surviving Mexico's Dirty War: A Political Prisoner's Memoir (Voices of Latin American Life)
"The book's particular strengths lie in the author's ability to recreate, often in great detail, the environment and lived experiences of a young, idealistic member of the left-wing guerrilla movement that exploded on the Mexican political scene in the early-to-mid 1970s." Eric Zolov, Franklin and Marshall College "This translation of the Spanish-language Sendenero en tenieblas (2004) is a welcome addition to the near-empty shelf of contemporary studies of Mexico's dirty war, and on modern Guerrero more specifically...The memoir will also serve as a valuable primary source for scholars examining this period of Guerrerense activism...and it provides an important personal component that contributes to humanizing and complicating often agonizing decisions and their ramifications." The Americas "An inside story of guerrilla activities and a gripping tale of imprisonment and torture at the hands of the Mexican government" Hispanic Outlook in Higher Education "Ulloa Bornemann's accessible memoir is an intensely self-reflective, critical and sometimes even ironic account of the life of an engaged but naive young man from the upper middle classes, who plunged into a world of armed resistance and ideological factionalism, and struggled his way through the dungeons of an authoritarian state...[T]his book [is] a revealing and horrifying document." Bulletin of Latin American Research "Alberto Ulloa Bornemann's testimonial account of his disappearance, imprisonment and torture--the first significant memoir of a political prisoner from Mexico's 'dirty war' of the 1970s--is so important, for it should remind us, and Mexicans themselves, not to forget a past that was both so sinister yet so recent...As the Schmidts point out in their introduction, this work is an important contribution to the genre of testimonial literature that has emerged in Latin America in the late 20th century that is distinguished, above all, by the moral force of the accounts related. Temple University Press must be praised for publishing this book: it makes an important contribution to our understanding of Mexico in the 1970s and gives us a unique insight into the activities and ideas prevalent within the guerrilla organizations of the period, and into the character of figures such as Cabanas." Latin American Review of Books "Ulloa's account of his capture, torture, and imprisonment is harrowing...The book offer[s] great insights into the weakness of the Mexican revolutionary left during the 1960s and 1970s and the barbarism of the PRI government." Latin American Politics and Society "The translation of Alberto Ulloa Bornemann's highly personal testimony, originally published in Mexico as Sendero de tinieblas (2004), is quite timely. Reminiscent of Jacobo Timerman's searing account of his detention by the Argentine military (Preso sin nombre, celda sin numero, 1981), Ulloa's narrative chronicles in labyrinthine fashion the experiences that led to his arrest and imprisonment as a subversive... Ulloa offers a critical insider's view of the armed left, which was thoroughly balkanized and riven by divisions regarding ideology, strategy, and leadership... Ably translated, and enhanced by an excellent introduction and glossary, Ulloa's candid memoir is obligatory reading for anyone interested in the dark history of the Cold War in Latin America." The Hispanic American Historical Review