About this item
Horizontal Vertigo: The title refers to the fear of ever-impending earthquakes that led Mexicans to build their capital city outward rather than upward. With the perspicacity of a keenly observant flneur, Juan Villoro wanders through Mexico City seemingly without a plan, describing people, places, and things while brilliantly drawing connections among them. In so doing he reveals, in all its multitudinous glory, the vicissitudes and triumphs of the city's cultural, political, and social history: from indigenous antiquity to the Aztec period, from the Spanish conquest to Mexico City today--one of the world's leading cultural and financial centers. In this deeply iconoclastic book, Villoro organizes his text around a recurring series of topics: "Living in the City," "City Characters," and "Shocks, Crossings, and Ceremonies.
About the Author
Juan Villoro is Mexico's preeminent novelist. Born in Mexico City in 1956, he is the author of half a dozen prize-winning novels and is also a journalist. In 2004, he received the Herralde Prizefor his novel
