Horizontal Vertigo

At once intimate and wide-ranging and as enthralling surprising and vivid as the place itself this is a uniquely eye-opening tour of one of the great metropolises of the world and its largest Spanish-speaking city.<br> &#160;<br> <i>Horizontal Vertigo: </i>The title refers to the fear of ever-impending earthquakes that led Mexicans to build their capital city outward rather than upward. With the perspicacity of a keenly observant flaneur Juan Villoro wanders through Mexico City seemingly without a plan describing people places and things while brilliantly drawing connections among them. In so doing he reveals in all its multitudinous glory the vicissitudes and triumphs of the city &#146;s cultural political and social history: from indigenous antiquity to the Aztec period from the Spanish conquest to Mexico City today&#151;one of the world&#146;s leading cultural and financial centers.<br> &#160;<br> In this deeply iconoclastic book Villoro organizes his text around a recurring series of topics: &#147;Living in the City&#148; &#147;City Characters&#148; &#147;Shocks&#148; &#147;Crossings&#148; and &#147;Ceremonies.&#148; What he achieves miraculously is a stunning intriguingly coherent meditation on Mexico City&#146;s genius loci its spirit of place.