Desolation and Desperation Theme Analysis

In the world of The Devil’s Highway, desolation is a daily lived reality for the desperate, impoverished Mexican immigrants who, in May of 2001, set out to cross the U.S.-Mexico border. Seeking to escape the poverty and hopelessness that define their lives in Veracruz, the men who would become the Wellton 26 take out loans, leave their families behind, and risk everything to travel to the border. Upon crossing it, they find themselves abandoned by their polleros, or smugglers, in a stretch of desert which has been known by many names throughout history—one of which is Desolation. In seeking to escape the state of mind and the lived experience of desolation, the men come to find themselves in a new state of desolation—that of the desert itself. The ancient desert is a vicious and at times seemingly living, breathing terrain with a will of its own. Throughout the text, Urrea argues that desolation and desperation are, perhaps, inescapable when it comes to the oft-misunderstood and scarcely-seen world of the U.S.-Mexico border.

Early on in the text, Urrea offers an unsparing portrait of the desolation which affects Veracruz—the southern Mexican state from which the majority of the Wellton 26 came—and the desperation that desolation inspires. A rural and tropical state, Veracruz was, in 2001, in a state of financial collapse. Many Veracruzians were “killing themselves” through difficult and demanding physical labor—often the only jobs available in an overfished, overfarmed region where the price of coffee—the main export—had collapsed. Though Coca-Cola and Pepsi factories offered jobs and this created “small waves of semiprosperity” throughout the years, in 2001 the cost of living and feeding a family were rising and rising. The sense of desperation this economic climate created is what drove many men from the region to seek passage into America—the majority of the Wellton 26 had enlisted in the scheme of a local recruiter for the Cercas smuggling game in order to earn enough money to provide their children with food and an education or to build new homes—or improve on the often shoddily-constructed homes they already lived in--for their wives and families. The desperation and desolation in Veracruz, however, would only be met with a new kind of desolation as the Wellton 26 arrived at the border.

The land where the United States meets Mexico is harsh, dangerous, and desolate. The great mythic desert of Desolation—a place where, according to some ancient religious texts, fallen angels are chained and buried beneath the sand—could, Urrea writes, very well be the Yuma desert itself. The Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge is situated within that desert, and the Devil’s Highway is situated within the Cabeza Prieta. The Wellton 26 were told by their smugglers that they would need to pass through three separate deserts in order to reach salvation, and as their group grew more and more lost and began to suffer the slow and agonizing effects of heat death, or hyperthermia, their desperation to find water and civilization—and their desolation when they realized that that might never happen—only grew. In their desperation the men drank their own urine and tore spiny cacti apart with their bare hands in order to get at the lifesaving liquid inside. Desperation once again was all that was driving the men forward—and as they moved on, they only encountered more emotional desolation and deeper, more barren parts of the desert Desolation.

At the text’s conclusion, Urrea—writing an Afterword penned ten years after the book’s initial publication--considers the lives of those still living in Desolation: the Migra, or the Border Patrol, the locals, and the government officials with the power to effect change in the area. Though much has changed in the area, “the worst” of it has remained the same—and what changes have come, Urrea argues, have only been made in response to the feelings of desperation and desolation that grow out of bearing witness to the continued violence and death along the border. Emergency towers have been erected throughout the Cabeza Prieta which allow lost walkers to summon help from the Border Patrol—these were implemented after the Yuma 14’s deaths highlighted graphically the extreme desolation of the area and the inhumane suffering of the illegal immigrants who become lost or are abandoned trying to traverse it. More Border Patrol officers have been installed not just in Wellton, the sector of the border where the Wellton 26 were found, but in other areas, as well—these new opportunities have been created in response to the violence of border gangs and drug smugglers, and the crimes of desperation and desolation they commit.

As Urrea’s narrative unfolds, desolation the feeling and Desolation the place become inextricably intertwined. The Wellton 26, driven by desolation, arrive in Desolation, only to encounter more desolation. Desperate situations lead to experiences of desolation which then lead to an even greater, finally actionable sense of desperation. Urrea’s argument that desperation and desolation form a vicious and torturous cycle which feeds endlessly upon itself is highlighted in the journey of the Wellton 26 from Veracruz to the border, in their torturous trek through the harsh desert, and in the reforms which were enacted in the wake of the country’s bearing witness to their horrific ordeal.