México en el imaginario zorrillesco: los Recuerdos del tiempo viejo

In his memoir Recuerdos del tiempo viejo (1880-1882), José Zorrilla evokes the eleven years of his residence in Mexico from January 1855 to June 1866. The abundant news he conveys about that period have an undeniable historical and biographical value, even if at times they are inaccurate or outline a psychological profile that does not square with what he experienced there. Still more relevant is how Zorrilla’s open-mindedness adds to the interest of the narrative as text. The multi-faceted memorialist (witness, participant, and histor) shares different perspectives on Mexican society and history: keen observant of the habits and mores of a dynamic community which, despite being anchored in its traditions, was bent on modernization; critic of the Spanish conquest; tracker of the colonial legacy that he perceives in the towns and cities he visits; supporter of the Mexican independence; and well-informed chronicler of contemporary events –the Reform War and the Second Empire– that he witnesses firsthand while there