José López Portillo y Rojas
(Guadalajara, 1850-Mexico City, 1923) Mexican novelist.The son of a lawyer, with a good clientele and an economic position, he studied law and completed his training with a long journey through Europe and Asia, experience that he collected in a book entitled Travel impressions (1873).
José López Portillo y Rojas
Journalist, practicing lawyer, magistrate, deputy and governor of Jalisco, he was Secretary of Foreign Relations with Victoriano Huerta (1914).López Portillo did not reach true literary hierarchy with the aforementioned travel book, nor with his poetry ( Fugitive Harmonies , 1892); His essay attempts are not without interest: Rosario la de Acuña (1920) and Rise and Fall of Porfirio Díaz (1921), although neither would the author have passed the posterity with them.
On the other hand, he deserves attention as a short story writer, because in his short stories the qualities of the writer of regional tone with naturalistic influences are noticed: Six legends (1883), Short novels (1909), Events and short novels (1903), Histories, comics and short stories (1918).
These short stories were compiled in 1952 ( Complete stories ).Enrique Anderson Imbert pointed out that in one of them, In diligence , the author raises the problem of the literary struggle between naturalism and romanticism; but the critic affirms that López Portillo "departed from the romantic and did not enter into naturalism."
The best of his work are the long novels: La parcela (1898), which is the best known of them; Los precursors (1909), which touches on the closure of convents, and Strong and weak (1919), with a theme of the Mexican revolution of 1910.In The parcel , two landowners, Pedro Ruiz and Miguel Díaz, dispute their piece of land of little value by means of intrigue and bribery; their respective children, Gonzalo and Ramona, love each other and end up succeeding and marrying, taking advantage of an occasional reconciliation by their parents.The regional and peasant atmosphere is painted with a vigorous and accurate hand.
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