Love and Despair

Rezensionen / Stimmen

"This is one of the most original works of scholarship about Mexican political history for a generation, and fills a large gap in knowledge about the growing pains of modernity in a country where the confrontation between restless youth and an oppressive regime was bloody and unforgiving. . . This book is a tour de force-or perhaps we should say, a labour of love-and the author has made an important contribution to the history of an insurgent period that is both misunderstood and sidelined." * Latin American Review of Books * "[R]equired reading for scholars and graduate students of midcentury Mexico and Mexican political, religious, and media history. Scholars of any regional focus with an interest in Catholicism, the global sixties, culture during the Cold War, youth culture, and cinema should also add this book to their reading list." * Hispanic American Historical Review * "The historian Jaime Pensado offers an ambitious work and sources on Mexican Catholics in the 1940s-1970s... Love and Despair will undoubtedly become an essential reference for the religious and political history of Mexico." * Cahiers des Ameriques latines * "The book is certainly a welcome addition to the literature, not only to the political, social, and cultural history of modern Mexico, but to Cold War and Catholic Mexico as well." * A Contracorriente * "Pensado does path-breaking work to reveal why and how Catholics of all ideological stripes became a formidable opposition to Mexico's PRI dictatorship-both important questions to explore as Mexico's democratic transition (2000-present) comes under greater scrutiny." * The Journal of Social History * "An indispensable study of the Cold War in Latin America, for Pensado treats Catholicism (and religion, more generally) seriously, not simply as a reactionary or declining force." * Journal of Latin American Studies * "Pensado offers an innovative cultural history of Mexico's long 1960s (1956-1976) through a religious lens. Each of his nine chapters places Catholic individuals like Marroquin at the center of his narrative. Together, these figures amount to a collective biography of Catholicism's multiple responses-rejection, acceptance, tolerance, participation-to a world and a country undergoing profound cultural, political, and social change." * NACLA * "Pensado narrates Mexico's October 2, 1968 protest and government repression from a unique vantage point: the inside of a church. . . .In narrating this iconic moment from the interior of a church, Pensado underscores the centrality of the Catholic Church, its cultural, intellectual, and political traditions, to twentieth-century Mexico. . . .[A] deep history of a crucial but understudied element of modern Mexico." * Pacific Historical Review * "Pensado has written a book that presents a unique perspective because he was able to locate films that were long censored in Mexico, and other documents that were not widely distributed. This book deserves a place in university libraries, particularly those with a focus on Latin American religion and politics." * Catholic Library World * "In a thoughtful exploration of Catholic participants in Cold-War-era Mexican politics and counterculture, Jaime Pensado lays bare many historiographic misconceptions. Rejecting notions of a religious worldview marked by its homogeneity, institutional rigidity, and reactionary politics, Pensado instead persuasively demonstrates the dynamic roles of Catholic thinkers. Using comprehensive evidence, he offers a vision of a sophisticated countercultural moment." * The Americas * "An essential dark-side-of-the-moon history that should be read by anyone wanting a sophisticated cultural and political take on 1960s Mexico, Catholic youth, and the input of Catholics into Mexico's counterculture(s). Readers are guaranteed to put it down with more feelings of love." * American Historical Review *