The Los Angeles Times pays tribute to the life of Mexican writer Carlos Fuentes who died Tuesday, March 15, 2013 at the age of 83. Fuentes was a prolific writer who crafted over 30 novels and non-fiction works. He was an outspoken and frequent critic of Mexican politics and government. As the story goes, he told Mexican President Felipe Calderon that the war on drugs would not end until the U.S. acknowledged its part in illicit drug trafficking.
The generation of rebellious, educated Mexican intellectuals who command respect worldwide for their authority, integrity, and pointed commentary are aging. Fuentes was part of the Latin American 1960’s and 1970’s “El Boom” of literary giants including Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Jorge Mario Pedro Vargas Llosa who poked at the failures of social and political idealism and action through their writings.
A 1987 NPR “Fresh Air” Conversation with Carlos Fuentes
“He wrote of a post-revolutionary Mexico, where the revolutionaries had become business entrepreneurs and bourgeoisie,” said Homero Aridjis, a prominent Mexican poet and writer who knew Fuentes for decades. “Styling himself after Dickens and Balzac, he wrote novels that formed a kind of ‘Mexican Comedy,’ a deep portrait of Mexican society, economy and politics.”
Fuentes last column for the Mexico City paper, Reforma, appeared on Tuesday, the day he died. In this, he posited why the three candidates for President were taking petty jibes at each other instead of focusing on important issues.
Who is there to step in and carry-on in the great tradition of the Mexican reformists?
Fuentes passing is a reminder about the importance of speaking out for justice and to pay due respect to the great talent that Mexico contributes to the world of art, culture and literature.
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Fellow blogger Shannon Pixley Sheppard includes a list of Carlos Fuentes’ works below and writes: It was the California connection that allowed for my introduction to the writings of Fuentes. The acquaintance came through The Old Gringo, a fictionalized story of the disappearance in Mexico, during the Mexican Revolution, of real life writer and US Civil War veteran, Ambrose Bierce. Following the Civil War, Bierce wound up in California, where he was a contributor to the literary journal, The Argonaut, founded and edited by one of my relatives, about whom, Bierce wrote a typically acerbic epitaph: Here lies Frank Pixley — as usual. So, in my ongoing attempt to unravel some of the mysteries surrounding living and being in Mexico, reading the The Old Gringo was a no-brainer. As The Guardian’s obituary of Carlos Fuentes concludes, Throughout his life, wherever he lived, Mexico was the centre of Fuentes’s artistic preoccupations. In his late 70s, he provided a typically graphic description of the attraction he felt for his own land: “It’s a very enigmatic country, and that’s a good thing because it keeps us alert, makes us constantly try to decipher the enigma of Mexico, the mystery of Mexico, to understand a country that is very, very baroque, very complicated and full of surprises.” Carlos Fuentes is not uncontroversial, but you should see for yourself. If you are not familiar with his writings, you might want to visit your local library and checkout a book or two. For those in Oaxaca, the Oaxaca Lending Library has the following titles: Fiction Non Fiction
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Cultural Dialogs: Dance of the Feather in Teotitlan del Valle
On Wednesday night this week, the San Pablo Academic and Cultural Center hosted the first in a series of community dialogs about indigenous life in Oaxaca. The restored chapel was filled to standing room only with Teotitecos and friends who came to hear a panel discussion introducing the new book, La Danza de la Pluma en Teotitlån del Valle written by Jorge Hernandez-Diaz, a cultural anthropologist at the state Benito Juarez Autonomous University of Oaxaca.
In addition to Professor Hernandez-Diaz, panelists included Uriel Santiago, one of the 2007-2009 group of dancers who made a promise and commitment to God, their church, community and culture by learning and performing this ancient tradition for a period of three years. Uriel first welcomed guests in Zapotec then moved into Spanish. Years ago Uriel explained to me that the Dance of the Feather is not a folkloric event designed to entertain people. It is a serious expression of Zapotec identity and cultural continuity. We made a documentary film about his experience in 2008 which you can see on YouTube.
The book, published in Spanish by the Oaxaca Secretary of Culture and Arts, with support from the Alfredo Harp Helu Foundation and the Office of the Governor of Oaxaca, offers three possible explanations about the origins of the dance, how it is interpreted in Teotitlan del Valle, other Oaxaca villages where the dance is an integral part of annual celebration, the rituals and traditions associated with the dance, and how the dance is organized and who can participate, plus lots more. The professor explains in his book that the dance is expressed with variations in many Mexican states, too.
Each year in Teotitlan del Valle beginning in early July and lasting for about a week, the Dance of the Feather is performed in the church courtyard. Every three years the group changes and is organized/trained by a different leader. The 2007-2009 maestro was Don Antonio Ruiz. The book recognizes all the members of this particular group by name and the role they danced–Moctezuma, the indigenous kings who succumbed to the conquest, and Malinche/Doña Marina.
Some of the group members are cousins. Since the time of the dance, many of them have married and had children. They have become doctors, educators and skilled weavers. They remain close, committed to each other and their community, treasuring the time they devoted to transmitting their cultural heritage and ensuring continuity.
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Posted in Books & Resources, Cultural Commentary, Teotitlan del Valle
Tagged books, Dance of the Feather, Mexico, Oaxaca