Elena Poniatowska - Major Works

Major Works

Her major investigative works include La noche de Tlatelolco (Massacre in Mexico) (1971), Fuerte es el silencio (Strong is Silence) (1975) and Nada nadie. Las voces del temblor (Nothing No one: The Voices of the Earthquake) (1988) . The best known of these is La noche de Tlatelolco about the 1968 repression of student protests in Mexico City. She found out about the massacre on the evening of October 2, 1968, when her son was only four months old. Afterwards, Poniatowska went out on the streets in the neighborhood and began interviewing people while there was still blood on the streets and shoes strewn about and women searching for the children who had not come home. The books contains interviews with informants, eyewitnesses, former prisoners which are interspersed with poems by Octavio Paz and Rosario Castellanos, excepts from pre Hispanic texts and newspaper as well as political slogans. Massacre in Mexico was the only book published on the subject for twenty years, contradicting the government’s account of the events and the number dead. The government offered her the Xavier Villaurrutia Award in 1970 for the work but she refused it.

She did the same after the 1985 Mexico City earthquake. Her book about this event Nada, nadie, las voces del temblor was a compilation of eyewitness accounts not only to the destruction of the earthquake, but also to the incompetence and corruption of the government afterwards.

Fuerte es el silencio is about several themes, especially the families of disappeared political prisoners, the leaders of workers’ movements, another look at the massacre in Tlatelolco and others who have defied the government.

Her first novel was Lilus Kikusy from 1954. It is a coming-of-age story about Mexican women before feminism. It centers on an inquisitive girl who is carefully molded by society to become an obedient bride. Tinísima is a fictionalized biography of Italian photographer and political activist Tina Modotti. This book was the result of ten years of researching the life of the photographer and political activist. Querido Diego (Dear Diego) is an epistolary recreation of Diego Rivera’s relationship with his first wife, Russian painter Angelina Beloff with the aim of “de-iconize” him.

Hasta no verte Jesús mío (Here’s to You, Jesusa) from 1969 tells the story of Jesusa Palancares, a poor women who fought in the Mexican Revolution and who later became a washerwomen in Mexico City. It is considered to be a breakthrough in testimonial literature written after about ten years of interviews with the real life women by Poniatowska.

Las Soldaderas: Women of the Mexican Revolution is about the women who were in combat accompanied by photographs from the era. Las siete cabritas (The Seven Little Goats) is about seven women in Mexican society in the 20th century, only one of whom, Frida Kahlo, is well known. The others are Pita Amor, Nahui Olín, María Izquierdo, Elena Garro, Rosario Castellanos and Nellie Campobello .

La piel del cielo (The Skin of the Sky) provides moving descriptions of various regions of Mexico, as well as the inner workings of politics and government.