Mexico in Mind: An Anthology

The 31 Anglophone writers from myriad genres collected in this anthology look to Mexico for adventure, refuge and revelation. Finn, who edited Cuba in Mind for Vintage's In Mind travel series, covers a number of eras and niches from unexpected angles: she has Harvard patrician Charles Macomb Flandrau (1871-1938) writing a letter home from a Chiapas coffee plantation; 19th century American adventuress Fanny Chambers Gooch Ingelhart writes of pinata whacking from her Saltillo adobe; a section from Graham Greene's Another Mexico (1939) describes seasickness unforgettably. More recent pieces from Richard Rodriguez, Ana Castillo and Salman Rushdie tackle identity, self-fashioning and myth with a few pages each. Finn's thoughtful organization allows readers to contemplate a discussion about market day between D.H. Lawrence, who feels the centavos are ""an excuse"" for an ""intermingling of voices, a threading together of different wills,"" and British culnarinian Diana Kennedy, more practical, who describes the counter at the market devoted to five varieties of cazon, or dogfish. In her introduction, Finn writes: ""Each of my visits to Mexico has been unsatisfying to me in the sense that I just want to go back and see more."" Her anthology has the same effect.