The Mexican Revolution, as Told Through Nonfiction and Graphic Novel

No one can underestimate the power of a revolution. The first major political and social revolution of the twentieth century began in Mexico. The Mexican Revolution began in 1910, when the President Porfirio Diaz had his dictatorship challenged by the reformist writer and politician, Francisco I. Madero. Madero’s uprising was supported by Emiliano Zapata from the south and Pascual Orozco and Pancho Villa in the north. 

While the dictatorship was overthrown by 1911, an entirely new set of problems arose, resulting in a civil war within Mexico. It was a combination of factors, mainly the concentration of wealth within the hands of the privileged and the widespread poverty within the soiled hands of the nation’s 11 million industrial and rural laborers, which contributed to Mexico’s eventual transformation into the modern era.

In the new book The Mexican Revolution: Conflict and Consolidation, 1910-1940 (TAMU Press, 2013), authors and historians Douglas W. Richmond and Sam W. Haynes delve deeper into Mexico’s civil war and the reforms that followed, providing new insight and attention to the revolution. The Mexican Revolution also studies the effects of the struggle in Mexico on the American Southwest, showing that the region experienced waves of ethnically motivated violence and economic tensions.


If you’re interested in a more creative retelling of the Mexican Revolution, new graphic novels (in Spanish)  featuring rancheros, hacienda owners, and warlords detail the revolution with powerful imagery and iconography. Click here to read the full article.

--Madeline Loving