"Los De Abajo" (1940) Primera novela revolucionaria- Escritor de Lagos de Moreno Don Mariano Azuela

On June 1, 1940, the film "Los de abajo" (featuring the División del Norte), by the writer Mariano Azuela from Lagos de Moreno, premiered at the Regis Cinema. Directed by Chano Urueta, a prominent figure in Mexican cinema during the Golden Age, and starring Emilio "El Indio" Fernández, Carlos López Moctezuma, Isabela Corona, Miguel Ángel Ferriz, and Miguel Inclán, with cinematography by Gabriel Figueroa and music by Silvestre Revueltas, the film portrays the bloodthirsty Villistas, who were both criticized and admired by Azuela. What this film makes clear is the disillusionment produced by the actual results of the Revolution. As Daniel Cosío Villegas expressed it: "All the figures of the revolution, without exception, fell short of its expectations." "Los de abajo" is the best-known novel by the writer Mariano Azuela (1873-1952), from Jalisco. It was published in installments in the newspaper El Paso del Norte in 1915, and as a book in 1916. It achieved great popularity when it was republished in installments in 1925 in the newspaper El Universal Ilustrado. Its early editions included the subtitle “Scenes and Pictures of the Current Revolution.” The Underdogs describes the formation and vicissitudes of a group of peasant fighters led by the leader Demetrio Macías. The novel portrays their daily lives, as well as their battles against the federal troops and their alliance with General Natera for the capture of Zacatecas. In the end, due to conflicts between the Villistas and Carrancistas, Demetrio Macías's group returns to its place of origin and suffers a defeat that calls into question the meaning of the struggle. Through the character of Luis Cervantes, a doctor and journalist who joins Macías's group, Azuela exposes the contrasts between the political ideals of the Enlightenment thinkers and the ignorant pragmatism of the peasant guerrillas. This work is the paradigm of the Novel of the Revolution, a genre that refers to realist works that emerged as critical portrayals of the Mexican Revolution. Due to the clear definition of its episodes and its moralistic intent, Los de abajo (The Underdogs) has become one of the most widely read Mexican novels in schools. The definitive text was established in 1958, when the novel was published in the first volume of the author's Complete Works by the Fondo de Cultura Económica, edited by Francisco Monterde. Its paperback edition sold one million copies in 1983. Dr. José Everardo López-Padilla, Medical Historian at the Historical Archive of the Cathedral Basilica of San Juan de los Lagos.