Book Review: Horizontal Vertigo

Juan Villoro, Horizontal Vertigo: a City Called Mexico. New York: Pantheon Books, 2021. ISBN: 9781524748883.

 

Genre: essays

Subgenre: history, urban history, Mexico

Format: hardcover

Source: Berea branch, Madison County (KY) Public Library

 

This is a collection of essays about Mexico City. Horizontal vertigo "refers to the fear of ever-impending earthquakes that led Mexicans to build their capital city outward rather than upward" (from the book's description). The essays take readers from indigenous antiquity, the rise and fall of the Aztecs, the Spanish conquest, independence to modern times up to the 2017 earthquake. 

The essays are arranged into the following topics: 

• City characters. These are sketches and profiles of specific city characters. 
• Shocks. 
• Crossings.
• Ceremonies.

The author also explains the book's structure a bit further: 

 

"Horizontal Vertigo includes various kinds of testimonial devices. This book combines a multitude of genres, and, in a certain sense, it is various books. Structurally, it follows the criterion of zapping. The episodes do not move forward in linear fashion, but, instead, follow the zigzagging of memory or the detours endemic to city life" (5). 

You can either read the book from beginning to end, or you can pick one of the themes and read those essays. The author, who is also a novelist, writes with a style that blends nonfiction with the feel of fiction. He blends personal memories of growing up and living in the city with keen observations and attention to detail. The result is a very intimate and at times moving portrayal of the city and its people. The author also integrates insights from fields like sociology and economics, yet the book is not a textbook. It's a blend of various narratives as diverse as the many who live in the city from the poor to the very wealthy. 

Essays vary in length, and some are more interesting than others. The book does lend itself more to browsing and reading what interests you than reading it cover to cover. 

A small note that this edition is an English translation from the original Spanish. In my case, I would have preferred to read it in Spanish. The translation is good, but I found some words and concepts, which as a Spanish reader, it is better to read in Spanish. Still, for English readers the translation works well. 

Overall, I liked the book. It could be a bit slow at times, but it is a nice and immersive narrative of the city. This is a good choice for libraries. It is a book I would acquire for our library. I'd buy it in both languages. If your library collects books in Spanish, acquiring a copy in Spanish may be a good option too. 

3 out of 5 stars.