Best Latin American Writers

Juan Rulfo

Juan Nepomuceno Carlos Pérez Rulfo Vizcaíno, best known as Juan Rulfo (Spanish: [ˈxwan ˈrulfo] About this soundaudio (help·info); 16 May 1917 – 7 Janu...

Juan Nepomuceno Carlos Pérez Rulfo Vizcaíno, best known as Juan Rulfo (Spanish: [ˈxwan ˈrulfo] About this soundaudio (help·info); 16 May 1917 – 7 January 1986[1]), was a Mexican writer, screenwriter and photographer. He is best known for two literary works, the 1955 novel Pedro Páramo, and the collection of short stories El Llano en llamas (1953). This collection includes the popular tale "¡Diles que no me maten!" ("Tell Them Not to Kill Me!"). Rulfo was born in 1917 in Apulco, Jalisco (although he was registered at Sayula), in the home of his paternal grandfather.[1] Rulfo's birth year was often listed as 1918, because he had provided an inaccurate date to get into the military academy that his uncle, David Pérez Rulfo — a colonel working for the government — directed.[2][3] After his father was killed in 1923 and his mother died in 1927, Rulfo's grandmother raised him in Guadalajara, Jalisco.[1] Their extended family consisted of landowners whose fortunes were ruined by the Mexican Revolution and the Cristero War of 1926–1928, a Roman Catholic revolt against the persecutions of Christians by the Mexican government, following the Mexican Revolution.[4] Rulfo was sent to study in the Luis Silva School, where he lived from 1928 to 1932.[5] He completed six years of elementary school and a special seventh year from which he graduated as a bookkeeper, though he never practiced that profession.[citation needed] Rulfo attended a seminary (analogous to a secondary school) from 1932 to 1934, but did not attend a university afterwards, as the University of Guadalajara was closed due to a strike and because Rulfo had not taken preparatory school courses.[1] Rulfo moved to Mexico City, where he entered the National Military Academy, which he left after three months. He then hoped to study law at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. In 1936, Rulfo was able to audit courses in literature at the University, because he obtained a job as an immigration file clerk through his uncle.

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Julio Ramón Ribeyro

Julio Ramón Ribeyro Zúñiga (August 31, 1929 in Lima, Peru – December 4, 1994 in Lima, Peru) was a Peruvian writer best known for his short stories. He...

Julio Ramón Ribeyro Zúñiga (August 31, 1929 in Lima, Peru – December 4, 1994 in Lima, Peru) was a Peruvian writer best known for his short stories. He was also successful in other genres: novel, essay, theater, diary and aphorism. In the year of his death, he was awarded the US$100,000 Premio Juan Rulfo de literatura latinoamericana y del Caribe. His work has been translated into numerous languages, including English. The characters in his stories, often autobiographical and usually written in simple but ironic language, tend to end up with their hopes cruelly dashed. But despite its apparent pessimism, Ribeyro's work is often comic, its humor springing from both the author's sense of irony and the accidents that befall his protagonists. A collection was published under the title La palabra del mudo (The Word of the Mute). Ribeyro studied literature and law in Universidad Católica in Lima. In 1960 he immigrated to Paris where he worked as a journalist in France Presse and then as cultural advisor and ambassador to UNESCO. He was an avid smoker, as described in his short story ¨Sólo para fumadores¨ (For smokers only), and he died as a result of his addiction. His last years were spent traveling between Europe and Peru. In the last year of his life he had decided to remain definitely in his homeland in Peru. He died on December 4, 1994, days after getting the Juan Rulfo Prize for Literature.

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