The Underdogs

The classic novel of the Mexican Revolution follows the peasant Demetrio Macías, who takes to the sierra to fight the federal troops and rises to a general in the revolutionary armies, only to be swept up in the factional wars and the futility of the whirlwind. Azuela sets it in the real country of the fighting: the mountains and villages of the Jalisco–Zacatecas sierra, the great battle of Zacatecas, and the Juchipila canyon where Demetrio begins and ends.

Demetrio Macías

The sierra (Demetrio's village)

Part 1

When the federal troops come and burn him out, the peasant Demetrio flees to the sierra and gathers a band of fighters, and almost by accident becomes a revolutionary leader. Azuela opens on the hard mountain country and the ambush that launches Demetrio's rise, the whole Revolution seen from the level of the men who did the dying.

Part 1

inspired by Demetrio Macías takes to the sierra above his village after the federal soldiers burn his home; the mountains are drawn from the real Jalisco–Zacatecas sierra around the Juchipila canyon and sited there.

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Luis Cervantes

The raids (the towns)

Part 1

As the band grows and marches through the towns, it is joined by the educated deserter Luis Cervantes, who lends the peasants' fight a vocabulary of ideals he does not really share. Through his cynical, self-serving eyes, Azuela questions how much of the Revolution was conviction and how much sheer momentum and plunder.

Part 1

inferred Demetrio's band ranges through the towns and villages of the region, raiding and requisitioning; the specific towns are sited in the real sierra country of the fighting.

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