From time immemorial, Mexico's legendary beauty has been matched by intense historical drama. Mayan mythmakers, Aztec emperors, Spanish conquistadors, Yankee and French invaders, dictators and peasant revolutionaries are still vivid influences on Mexico's present.

In this stunning collection of essays, first published in Britain in 1997, Carlos Fuentes examines mexico as it faces a new time. Torn between tradition and modernity, impatient with an exhausted political system but unsure how and with what to replace it, Mexicans are struggling to make the transition from authoritarian to democratic politics. Fuentes' bold and timely study discusses the origins and nature of the unforeseen events that have transformed Mexico's politics and scoiety: the 1994 rebellion in Chiapas, the subsequent rash of assassinations, the break between Presidents Salinas and Zedillo, and continual traumas for democratic self-rule.