Les mousquetaires à Mexico. A propos de Sombra de la sombra

ABSTRACT - Sombra de la sombra can be read as a free adaptation of The Three Musketeers which inserts Dumas's characters in the 1922 Mexico, at the dawn of Obregon's mandate. The heroic action occurring in the large national territory belongs to the past and the Mexican Revolution has engendered a political system which doesn't permit anything else but submission or compromise. Taibo II's four friends inside the novel lack control upon the historical process as well as upon their own adventure. Suffering instead of acting —unlike d'Artagnan and his companions—, they are confronted with the unfathomable schemes of a cynical power perpetrating new abuses and new crimes. They can expect neither gratitude nor reconciliation. While the country evolves without them and against them, all they have left as far as space goes, is a city under control, whose changes also bear witness of a collective future which goes beyond them.