El Hijo del Ahuizote by [Mexico]. [Periodicals] - 1897

Mexico City, 1897. Good plus.. Fifty-one issues, each 8pp. or 16pp. with illustrated self wrappers. Bound together in contemporary quarter morocco and marbled boards. Top portion of spine detaching, boards scuffed, edges worn. Light toning and dust soiling, occasional faint foxing. Almost a complete run for the year 1896 of this important Mexican satirical weekly periodical. The magazine was founded in 1885 by Daniel Cabrera Rivera, Manuel Pérez Bibbins, and Juan Sarabia, and sold out multiple editions of its initial issues despite the disapproval of Porfirio Diaz and the Mexican government. The title of the paper was itself a parodic take on a popular pro-Diaz paper called El Ahuizote, and occasional, temporary bans on the paper prompted the publishers to temporarily assume other satiric monikers, such as El Padre del Ahuizote, El Nieto del Ahuizote, and El Bisnieto del Ahuizote. In 1902, the anarchist siblings Ricardo and Enrique Flores Magon joined the paper before their exile in 1904. More recently, the building that housed the periodical's offices and print shop was rehabilitated by one of the Magon's great-grandchildren and turned into a museum.

The present bound volume contains fifty-one issues from 1896, the eleventh year of publication. Although nothing is evidently lacking from the volume, the first issue is dated January 12. The front and rear covers of each issue bear colorful political cartoons, while the contents tend to include stridently liberal opinion and news pieces and a double-page cartoon at the centerfold; many issues also contain a literary section. The articles cover not only Mexican politics, but also the wider affairs of Latin America and, quite often, American involvement therein. This volume contains, naturally, much criticism of the contemporary actions of the Mexican government and church, as well as items on the unrest in Cuba, the U.S. Presidential election, and much more. A substantial and cohesive run of this significant periodical, occasionally referred to as the Punch of Mexico.