Mexico : The Passenger

Brimming with intricate research and enduring wonder, The Passenger is a love-letter to global travel

The Passenger collects the best new writing, photography, and reportage from around the world. Its aim, to break down barriers and introduce the essence of a place. Packed with essays and investigative journalism; original photography and illustrations; charts, and unusual facts and observations, each volume offers a unique insight into a different culture, and how history has shaped it into what it is today. 

“When you hold it your hands, The Passenger takes you back to another time, one when travel literature had a scent, and texture.”—Paco Nadal, El País

“These books are so rich and engrossing that it is rewarding to read them even when one is stuck at home.”―The TLS

“[The Passenger] has a strong focus on storytelling, with pages given over to a mix of essays, playlists and sideways glances at subcultures and thorny urban issues.”—MONOCLE

“Half-magazine, half-book… think of [The Passenger] as an erudite and literary travel equivalent to National Geographic, with stunning photography and illustration and fascinating writing about place.”—Independent.ie (Best series of the year – 2021)

“The Passenger readers will find none of the typical travel guide sections on where to eat or what sights to see. Consider the books, rather, more like a literary vacation--the kind you can take without braving a long flight in the time of Covid-19.”—Publisher''s Weekly

IN THIS VOLUME: Guadalupe Nettel on Mexico City・Elena Reina on femicide・Yasnaya Aguilar on indigenous languages and racism・Valeria Luiselli on Frida Kahlo and “fridolatry”・Dario Aleman on the Mayan Train project, and much more…

Mexico: once synonymous with escape and freedom, better known nowadays for widespread violence, narcotraffic, and migration. 

Sea, beaches, ancient ruins, tequila: under the patina of mass tourism there''s a complex, neurotic country trying to carve out a place for itself in the shadow of its hulky neighbour. 

The most populous Hispanic country in the world, 89 indigenous languages are spoken: a contradictory legacy reflected in its political, social, religious (and food!) culture. With a fifth of the population identifying as indigenous, rediscovering and revaluing the country''s pre-Columbian roots informs much of public debate. The controversial Mayan train project connecting Mexico''s Caribbean resorts with the South''s archaeological sites, crossing (and compromising) communities and forests, is a perfect example of the opposition between the two souls of the country. It''s the drive towards resolving this contradiction, or better still learning to live with it, that will define the Mexico of the future.