'Expanding experiences and opportunties'

 

“Literatureovertakes history, for literature gives you more than one life. It expandsexperience and opens new opportunities to readers.”—CarlosFuentes
Born on Nov. 11,1928 novelistand essayist Fuentes wrote The Death ofArtemio Cruz – often called THE seminal work of modern Spanish Americanliterature – and The Old Gringo, also made into a terrific movie.   
The Guardian called him "Mexico'smost celebrated novelist,” perhaps in part because of his being honored by hishome nation with its highest civilian award, the Belisario Domínguez Medal ofHonor.   He often was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature, though he never won (the Nobel isonly awarded to living artists and writers and he died in 2012).
Fuentes described himself as a"pre-modern" writer, using only pens, ink and paper. He asked, "Do wordsneed anything else?" Fuentes said that he detested those authors who fromthe beginning claim to have a recipe for success. In a speech on his writingprocess, he related that when he began the writing process, he began by asking,"Who am I writing for?" Translated into 24 languages withsales around the globe in the     many millions, Fuentes hated being pigeonholedinto one classification or another.  “I'ma writer, not a genre. Don't classify me, read me.”  As for advice to young writers, he saidsimply, “I am not interested in slice of life, what I want (from a writer) is aslice of the imagination.”