Showing posts with label Maximilian and Carlota. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Maximilian and Carlota. Show all posts

Monday, November 14, 2016

The Mexican Revolution at the Center for Big Bend Studies Annual Conference at Sul Ross State University


[[ WASHI & ULI, stop those suitcases! ]]
I have been visiting Alpine, Texas for the annual Center for Big Bend Studies conference to talk about Metaphysical Odyssey into the Mexican Revolution: Francisco I. Madero and His Secret Book, Spiritist Manual. Check out the conference, which is rich with archaeology and history and more on the Big Bend but also the wider region of West Texas and encompassing parts of the Mexican states of Chihuahua and Coahuila, here



UPDATE November 2017: The PDF of my paper, "The Secret Book by Francisco I. Madero, Leader of the 1910 Mexican Revolution," which is an expanded transcript of my talk about my book, Metaphysical Odyssey into the Mexican Revolution: Francisco I. Madero and His Secret Book, Spiritist Manual, can be downloaded here.  See also a brief video about four exceedingly rare books. In November 2017 I will be presenting "John Bigelow, Jr.: Officer with the Tenth Cavalry, Military Intellectual, and Nexus Between West and East." The link for that paper will be posted soon.


The keynote speaker was my amiga, M.M. McAllen, author of the extraordinary narrative history Maximilian and Carlota: Europe's Last Empire in Mexico. (Listen to our extra-bacon-on-top-crunchy conversation about the whole enchilada of Mexico's Second Empire / French Intervention for my "Conversations with Other Writers" occasional podcast series here.)

Funny, my Metaphysical Odyssey into the Mexican Revolution has zip to do with the Big Bend of Far West Texas. But the Mexican Revolution is a topic of perennial interest in this region; many battles and other incidents of the Mexican Revolution took place along the border in the Big Bend region, especially in the years after President Francisco I. Madero's assassination in 1913. 

UPDATE: Biographers International January 2017 Newsletter Q & A with Yours Truly about Metaphysical Odyssey into the Mexican Revolution: Francisco I. Madero and His Secret Book, Spiritist Manual. Read it here.

Moreover, it so happens that I am at work on a book about Far West Texas. It won't be a book of straight history, however, but an interweaving of personal narrative, history and reporting, and maybe the kitchen sink, too, in the style of my book about Mexico's Baja California peninsula, Miraculous Air. 

Herewith a batch of posts on this blog about the Big Bend:









Plus you will find 20 of a projected 24 "Marfa Mondays" podcasts, mainly interviews, posted to date, including Charles Angell in the Big Bend; Lisa Fernandes at the Pecos Rodeo; Mary Baxter on Painting the Big Bend; Avram Dumitrescu, and Artist in Alpine; and Cowboy Songs by Cowboys and an Interview with Michael Stevens. >>> Listen in anytime.

More anon.

> Your comments are always welcome. Write to me here. 






Monday, June 13, 2016

Monarchy in Mexico: The Super Crunchy Conversation with M.M. McAllen About Maximilian and Carlota



It has been a while since I posted the podcast of my super crunchy conversation with historian M.M. McAllen about her very fine narrative history, Maximilian and Carlota: Europe's Last Empire in Mexico. Since one of my own books, The Last Prince of the Mexican Empire, is about this same period, believe it, we got super crunchy in there. 

At long last the transcript is now available!




If you're not familiar with Mexico's most peculiarly glamorous and hyper-complex (and very violent) transnational episode, listen in, you will learn a lot. And even if you already know about Mexico's Second Empire / French Intervention, you're in for a treat yummier than champurrado.

About the Transcripts
Thanks to writer's guru Jane Friedman's wise suggestion to share transcripts of my podcasts, I have begun posting them for both my Conversations with Other Writers series and Marfa Mondays Podcasting Project. Although I do revise the transcripts, no, I don't do them myself-- if I did, I am quite sure every last brain cell would be fried like the proverbial egg on a Mexicali sidewalk! I use CLK Transcription. They do a fine and reasonably priced job, and I warmly recommend them.

About Upcoming Podcasts
So when is the next conversation with another writer? Sometime in 2017, because I am at work on a book about Far West Texas

As for those Marfa Mondays podcasts, which are apropos of the Far West Texas book, stay tuned for Marfa Mondays podcast #21... I am still working on it... Podcasts 22, 23 and 24 have been scheduled and I hope to have a complete draft of the book by the end of this year. In the meantime, I invite you to listen in any time to the previous 20 Marfa Mondays podcasts.

Multitudinous Transcripts of Yore

More transcripts from the Conversations with Other Writers series:
> Rose Mary Salum
> Sergio Troncoso
> Michael K. Schuessler
> Edward Swift
> Sara Mansfield Taber
> Solveig Eggerz
This is an ongoing occasional series. Another will be available in 2017.

Selected interview transcripts from the Marfa Mondays Podcasting Project:
> Raymond Caballero: On Mexican Revolutionary General Pascual Orozco and Far West Texas
> Israel Campos: BBQ Pitmaster in Pecos
> Greg Williams: Gifts of the Ancient Ones, the Rock Art of the Lower Pecos Canyonlands
> Dallas Baxter: This Precious Place
> Michael Stevens et al: Cowboy Songs by Cowboys
> Mary Baxter: Painting the Big Bend
> Paul Graybeal: Marfa's Moonlight Gemstones
There will be 24 in the Marfa Mondays series; 20 have been posted to date. The 21st will be posted shortly.



Your comments are always welcome.

Newsletter? Yes indeed.
It goes out every other month-ish.






Monday, January 11, 2016

Meanwhile, Over at My Other Blog, Maximilian~Carlota

I am still (whew) working on the next podcast, the 21st of a projected 24, for the Marfa Mondays Podcasting Project, which is apropos of my book in-progress on Far West Texas. (And by the way, as of today, when I finally posted the first one, all the transcripts are now available on-line.) It looks like podcast 21 will be a long one. In the meantime, I invite you-- most especially if you happen to be a Mexican history aficionado--to visit my other blog, Maximilian~Carlota, where I post about the research behind my novel, The Last Prince of the Mexican Empire-- plus tidbits ex-post.





I don't post as frequently there as I do here at "Madam Mayo," but I've been at it for a few years now so researchers of Mexico's Second Empire and the French Intervention will find heaps of both useful and exotically crunchy items in the archives. Herewith a list of the top crunchiest posts to date:

A Conversation with M.M. McAllen about her book, Maximilian and Carlota















P.S. You can also download the curious little gem My Recollections of Maximilian by "Marie de la Fere," edited and introduced by Yours Truly. 







Monday, January 04, 2016

A Conversation with M.M. McAllen about MAXIMILIAN AND CARLOTA: EUROPE'S LAST EMPIRE IN MEXICO

Happy New Year! Just posted: A Conversation with M.M. McAllen, which is number 8 in my occasional podcast series "Conversations with Other Writers" about her magnificent narrative history Maximilian and Carlota: Europe's Last Empire in Mexico, published by Trinity University Press in 2014.

My blurb: 

"A deeply researched book about a period of Mexican history that, while vital for understanding modern Mexico and its relations with the United States and Europe, is of perhaps unparalleled cultural, political, and military complexity for such a short period."

William H. Beezeley, coeditor of The Oxford History of Mexico says:

"A thorough, complete history of Mexico's second empire. The author leaves nothing untouched."

And Luis Alberto Urrea says:

"M.M. McAllen has written an important book that not only reads like a novel of fantastic inventions but is key to understanding the soul of Mexico today."

> Listen in to this podcast any time here.

I'll be posting a complete transcript shortly.

>Visit M.M. McAllen at her website www.mmmcallen.com

> Listen in to all the other Conversations with Other Writers and/or read their transcripts here.

Yes, I am still doing the Marfa Mondays Podcasting project, apropos of my book in-progress, World Waiting for a Dream: A Turn in Far West Texas. Stay tuned for podcast #21 in the 24 podcast series.





(includes a note on my panel with M.M. McAllen)


(books, podcasts and more)





Thursday, January 23, 2014

M.M. McAllen's New Book Maximilian and Carlota: Europe's Last Empire in Mexico


News over on my other blog, Maximilian-Carlota: A  blog for Researchers of the French Intervention/ Second Empire:

M.M. McAllen has just published Maximilian and Carlota: Europe's Last Empire in Mexico, available from Trinity University Press. I read it in draft form and thought it a superb addition to the bibliography. If you happen to be anywhere near San Antonio, Texas, hie on over to The Twig for her book presentation on Saturday February 8, 2014 at 4 pm, and get your signed first edition. It is sure to be a gripping read-- and a collector's item.

(The Twig is a lovely little bookstore. I read there myself back in 2009 on tour for my novel, The Last Prince of the Mexican Empire. As I recall there are several good restaurants around the corner-- so why not make a night of it? The event at the Twig is free and open to the public, by the way, and does include refreshments.)

Check out these bodacious reviews for M.M. McAllen's opus:


"On the 150th anniversary of the installation of Austria’s Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian von Habsburg as emperor of Mexico, McAllen offers an authoritative, detailed, and engrossing account of the rise and fall of Mexico’s Second Empire... McAllen ably demonstrates how the Second Empire’s collapse was one of the most spectacular personal tragedies and political failures of the 19th century." — Publishers Weekly

"This is a thorough, complete history of Mexico’s second empire. The author leaves nothing untouched."
— William H. Beezley, professor of history at the University of Arizona
"Maximilian and Carlota is a deeply researched book about a period of Mexican history that, while vital for understanding modern Mexico and its relations with the United States and Europe, is of perhaps unparalleled cultural, political, and military complexity for such a short period."
— C. M. Mayo, author of The Last Prince of the Mexican Empire
“Mexican history offers a phantasmagoria that beggars the imagination. Most writers seem to focus on three distinct eras: Conquest, Independence, and Revolution. But perhaps the most surreal, tragic, yet oddly comedic era in Mexico has gone largely unexamined, until now. M. M. McAllen has written an important book that not only reads like a novel of fantastic inventions but is key to understanding the soul of Mexico today. ” — Luis Albertio Urrea, author of The Hummingbird’s Daughter


And with many thanks to Gayle Brennan Spencer, who blogs at Postcards from San Antonio, I have been alerted to what looks like an excellent show at the Witte Museum in San Antonio, to go along with McAllen's book. Here's the press release:


New Exhibit, Maximilian and Carlota: Last Empire in Mexico, Accompanies Book by Mary Margaret McAllen 
SAN ANTONIO— The Witte Museum presents a new exhibit, Maximilian and Carlota: Last Empire in Mexico, opening February 1 through March 30, 2014 in the Betty Coates Textile Gallery. The rule of Maximilian and Carlota, Emperor and Empress of Mexico in the 1860s, is examined in this exhibit and accompanies the release of the book, Maximilian and Carlota: Europe’s Last Empire in Mexico written by South Texas scholar Mary Margaret McAllen, published by Trinity University Press. 
The exhibition features art and artifacts that have never been exhibited from the Witte’s permanent collections and several important private collections. Formal portraits of Maximilian and Carlota that were recently donated to the Witte Museum will be on public view for the first time. Newspaper articles, vintage photographs and objects from the Mexican Royal Court of the Emperor and Empress of Mexico will also be displayed.
Maximilian and Carlota: Last Empire in Mexico is generously supported by the City of San Antonio Department for Culture and Creative Development. The exhibit is included with general museum admission.
With over 400,000 visitors annually, the Witte Museum promotes lifelong learning through innovative exhibitions, programs and collections in natural history, science and South Texas heritage. For more information visit www.WitteMuseum.org 

Read more blog posts about this tumultuous period of Mexican history.

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