Homero Aridjis (born April 6, 1940) is a Mexican
poet
A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator (thought, thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral t ...
, novelist,
environmental activist
The environmental movement (sometimes referred to as the ecology movement) is a social movement that aims to protect the natural world from harmful environmental practices in order to create sustainable living. In its recognition of humanity a ...
,
journalist
A journalist is a person who gathers information in the form of text, audio or pictures, processes it into a newsworthy form and disseminates it to the public. This is called journalism.
Roles
Journalists can work in broadcast, print, advertis ...
, and former ambassador and ex-president of
PEN International
PEN International (known as International PEN until 2010) is a worldwide professional association, association of writers, founded in London in 1921 to promote friendship and intellectual co-operation among writers everywhere. The association ...
.
Family and early life
Aridjis was born in
Contepec
Contepec is a municipality in the Mexican state of Michoacán, located east of the state capital of Morelia, being the easternmost municipality in Michoacán.
Geography
The municipality of Contepec is located in the Trans-Mexican Volcanic Belt i ...
,
Michoacán
Michoacán, formally Michoacán de Ocampo, officially the Free and Sovereign State of Michoacán de Ocampo, is one of the 31 states which, together with Mexico City, compose the Political divisions of Mexico, Federal Entities of Mexico. The stat ...
, Mexico, on April 6, 1940, to a Greek father and a Mexican mother; he was the youngest of five brothers. His father fought in the Greek army during World War I and the
Greco-Turkish War, when his family was forced to flee from their home in Tire, southeast of Smyrna, in
Asia Minor
Anatolia (), also known as Asia Minor, is a peninsula in West Asia that makes up the majority of the land area of Turkey. It is the westernmost protrusion of Asia and is geographically bounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the south, the Aegean ...
. His mother grew up in Contepec amidst the turmoil of the
Mexican Revolution
The Mexican Revolution () was an extended sequence of armed regional conflicts in Mexico from 20 November 1910 to 1 December 1920. It has been called "the defining event of modern Mexican history". It saw the destruction of the Federal Army, its ...
. After nearly losing his life at age ten in a shotgun accident, Aridjis became an avid reader and began to write poetry. In 1959 he was awarded a scholarship at the
Rockefeller Foundation
The Rockefeller Foundation is an American private foundation and philanthropic medical research and arts funding organization based at 420 Fifth Avenue, New York City. The foundation was created by Standard Oil magnate John D. Rockefeller (" ...
-supported Mexico City Writing Center (Centro Mexicano de Escritores), the youngest writer to have received the award in the center's 55-year history.
Aridjis has published 51 books of poetry and prose, many of them translated into a dozen languages. His achievements include: the
Xavier Villaurrutia Award
The Xavier Villaurrutia Award (Premio Xavier Villaurrutia) is a prestigious literary prize given in Mexico, to a Latin American writer published in Mexico. Founded in 1955, it was named in memory of Xavier Villaurrutia.
Its jury is composed of pre ...
for best book of the year for ''Mirándola dormir'', in 1964, the youngest writer to receive the prize; the Diana-Novedades Literary Prize for the outstanding novel in Spanish, for ''Memorias del nuevo mundo'', in 1988; and the
Grinzane Cavour Prize
The Grinzane Cavour Prize (1982–2009) was an Italian literary award established in 1982 by Francesco Meotto. The annual award ceremony took place in the medieval castle of Grinzane Cavour. The goal of the prize was to attract young people to re ...
, for best foreign fiction, in 1992, for the Italian translation of ''1492, Vida y tiempos de Juan Cabezón de Castilla''. ''1492: The Life and Times of Juan Cabezón of Castile'' was a ''
New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'' Notable Book of the Year. He received the
Prix Roger Caillois
The prix Roger Caillois is an annual literary prize established in 1991 in partnership with the PEN Club in France and the as well as the Society of readers and friends of Roger Caillois, awarded to both a Latin American and a French author. Sinc ...
in France for his poetry and prose and
Serbia
, image_flag = Flag of Serbia.svg
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, map_caption = Location of Serbia (gree ...
's highest literary honor, the Smederevo Golden Key Prize, for his poetry. In 2005 the state of Michoacán awarded him the first Erendira State Prize for the Arts. Recently he received three poetry prizes in Italy: the Premio Internazionale di Poesia 2013, Premio Letterario Camaiore and the Premio Internazionale di Poesía Elena Violani Landi, Centro di Poesia Contemporanea, University of Bologna (2016);Premio Letterario Internazionale L'Aquila (2019). In 2024 he won the Griffin Poetry Prize in Canada for ''Self-Portrait in the Zone of Silence''.
Twice the recipient of a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship, Aridjis was named
Doctor Honoris Causa
An honorary degree is an academic degree for which a university (or other degree-awarding institution) has waived all of the usual requirements. It is also known by the Latin phrases ''honoris causa'' ("for the sake of the honour") or ''ad hono ...
by
Indiana University
Indiana University (IU) is a state university system, system of Public university, public universities in the U.S. state of Indiana. The system has two core campuses, five regional campuses, and two regional centers under the administration o ...
.
He has been a visiting professor at Indiana University,
New York University
New York University (NYU) is a private university, private research university in New York City, New York, United States. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded in 1832 by Albert Gallatin as a Nondenominational ...
and
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...
, and held the Nichols Chair in Humanities and the Public Sphere at the
University of California, Irvine
The University of California, Irvine (UCI or UC Irvine) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Irvine, California, United States. One of the ten campuses of the University of California system, U ...
. He has been an editorial page columnist at the Mexican newspapers ''
La Jornada
''La Jornada'' (''The Working Day'') is one of Mexico City's leading daily newspapers. It was established in 1984 by Carlos Payán Velver. The current editor (''directora general'') is Carmen Lira Saade. As of 2006 it had approximately 287,000 ...
'', ''
Reforma
Reforma, the Spanish word meaning reform, has the following meanings:
Companies and organizations
* ''Reforma'' (newspaper), a daily published in Mexico City
:* Grupo Reforma, parent company of the newspaper
:* Agencia Reforma, news wire agenc ...
'' and ''
El Universal'' since 1985, publishing hundreds of articles about environmental, political and literary topics.
Homero Aridjis has served as
Mexico's ambassador to the Netherlands and Switzerland and to
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...
in Paris. For six years between 1997 and 2003 he was President of
PEN International
PEN International (known as International PEN until 2010) is a worldwide professional association, association of writers, founded in London in 1921 to promote friendship and intellectual co-operation among writers everywhere. The association ...
, the worldwide association of writers.
Personal life
In 1965, Aridjis married Betty Ferber. They have two daughters,
Eva Aridjis
Eva Aridjis Fuentes is a Mexican and American filmmaker. She attended the American School Foundation in Mexico City, Princeton University, and New York University. She has made many prize-winning short and feature-length films.
Early life and ...
, a filmmaker in New York City (''Niños de la calle'', ''La Santa Muerte'', ''The Favor'', ''The Blue Eyes'', ''Chuy, el hombre lobo'', ''Goodbye Horses: The Many Lives of Q Lazzarus'') and writer
Chloe Aridjis
Chloe Aridjis (born 1971) is a Mexican and American novelist and writer. Her novel ''Book of Clouds'' (2009) was published in eight countries, and won the Prix du Premier Roman Étranger. Her second novel, ''Asunder'' was published in 2013 to un ...
, in London (''Asunder'', ''Book of Clouds'', ''Sea Monsters'', ''Topografía de lo insólito'', ''Dialogue with a Somnambulist: Stories, Essays & A Critical Portrait'').
Critical appreciation
*
Octavio Paz
Octavio Paz Lozano (March 31, 1914 – April 19, 1998) was a Mexican poet and diplomat. For his body of work, he was awarded the 1977 Jerusalem Prize, the 1981 Miguel de Cervantes Prize, the 1982 Neustadt International Prize for Literature, a ...
: "In the poetry of Homero Aridjis there is the gaze, the pulse of the poet, the discontinuous time of practical and rational life and the continuity of desire and death: there is the poet's primal truth."
*Kenneth Rexroth: "He is a visionary poet of lyrical bliss, crystalline concentrations and infinite spaces... I can think of no poet of Aridjis' generation in the Western Hemisphere who is as much at ease in the blue spaces of illumination – the illumination of transcending love. These are words for a new Magic Flute." (Introduction to "Blue Spaces")
*
Juan Rulfo
Juan Nepomuceno Carlos Pérez Rulfo Vizcaíno, best known as Juan Rulfo (; 16 May 1917 – 7 January 1986), was a Mexican writer, screenwriter, and photographer. He is best known for two literary works, the 1955 novel ''Pedro Páramo'', and the ...
: "The poetry of Homero Aridjis is a symbol of love. His work is very beautiful, above all, his style is very original, very novel."
*Guillermo Sucre: "All his poetry – ever since "Antes del reino" (1963)-- is a continual conquest of splendor."
*
Seamus Heaney
Seamus Justin Heaney (13 April 1939 – 30 August 2013) was an Irish Irish poetry, poet, playwright and translator. He received the 1995 Nobel Prize in Literature. Among his best-known works is ''Death of a Naturalist'' (1966), his first m ...
: "Homero Aridjis' poems open a door into light."
*''Mirándola dormir'':
**Joaquín Marco: "Mirándola dormir" is one of the most beautiful, profound and invigorating love poems in our language."
**José Miguel Oviedo: "Mirándola dormir" is a work of exceptional intensity and beauty. An admirable poetic prose has been the ideal channel for this erotic crossing. Handled with perfect control of its rhythms, its internal breathing and the precise integrity of its sounds, it has shown the voice of the Mexican poet in all its deep singularity."
*''Persephone'':
**
André Pieyre de Mandiargues
André Pieyre de Mandiargues (14 March 1909 – 13 December 1991) was a French writer born in Paris. He became an associate of the Surrealists and married the Italian painter Bona Tibertelli de Pisis (a niece of the Italian metaphysical pai ...
: "This vast poem in prose which is narrative but never stops being poetic, which is realistic but always fantastical, is a unique book in contemporary literature. The power of this poem, or of this scandalous and fascinating illumination, is incomparable."
**''
Harvard Bookshelf'': "A dazzling work of literature in any tradition, or language, by any standards."
**''
Le Nouvel Observateur
(), previously known as (2014–2024), (1964–2014), (1954–1964), (1953–1954), and (1950–1953), is a weekly French news magazine. Based in the 2nd arrondissement of Paris, ' is one of the three most prominent French news magazines ...
'': "Aridjis reinvents the multiplicity of language with rare mastery. This poetical form gives the story a new and splendid dimension."
*''1492: The Life and Times of Juan Cabezón of Castile'':
**''
The New York Times Book Review
''The New York Times Book Review'' (''NYTBR'') is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times'' in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely rea ...
'': "Succeeds in magisterially recreating that woeful and bizarre period of Spanish history that prefigured the discovery and conquest of America. The overall effect is one of splendidly rendered originality and authenticity... Swarms of minor characters cannot fail to remind us of classics like Cervantes' Don Quixote or of certain canvases by
Velázquez
Velázquez, also Velazquez, Velásquez or Velasquez (, ), is a surname from Spain. It is a patronymic name, meaning "son of Velasco".
References to "Velazquez" without a first name are often to the Spanish painter, Diego Velázquez.
Notable peo ...
or
El Greco
Doménikos Theotokópoulos (, ; 1 October 1541 7 April 1614), most widely known as El Greco (; "The Greek"), was a Greek painter, sculptor and architect of the Spanish Renaissance, regarded as one of the greatest artists of all time. ...
."
**''The Times Literary Supplement'': "An extraordinary account of religious persecution in the fifteenth century. The sense of menace and threat that Aridjis conjures up is extraordinary."
**''
La Quinzaine Litteraire'': "This superb book reads like the wind, like an epic chronicle. Homero Aridjis retrieves, through the miracle of his magical prose, the very essence of the twilight of Spain."
**''
Le Soir
''Le Soir'' (, ) is a French-language Belgian daily newspaper. Founded in 1887 by Émile Rossel, it was intended as a politically independent source of news. Together with '' La Libre Belgique'', it is one of the most popular Francophone newsp ...
'' (
Brussels
Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...
): "With 1492, Homero Aridjis has achieved a novel of exceptional grandeur."
**''
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...
'' (England): "A book of remarkable imaginative power, a looming shadow of a book, a pit and a pendulum all in one, measuring and burying, remorselessly bizarre. It is impossible not to respect the eloquence which Aridjis brings to lives facing the threat of sudden death at every point and the subtlety with which he insists that the death of the spirit is more terrible than anything that may befall the body."
**''
Espaces Latino-Américains'' (Michel Schneider): "1492 - Les Aventures de Juan Cabezón de Castille and 1492" – "Mémoires du Nouveau Monde": "Le diptyque sur et autour de 1492 constitue une fresque romanesque monumentale et exceptionnelle, qui place Homero Aridjis au premier plan de la littérature hispanique et latino-américaine d'aujourd'hui ».
*''The Lord of the Last Days: Visions of the Year 1000'':
**''
The Washington Post
''The Washington Post'', locally known as ''The'' ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'' or ''WP'', is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the national capital. It is the most widely circulated newspaper in the Washington m ...
'' (
James Reston
James "Scotty" Barrett Reston (November 3, 1909 – December 6, 1995) was an American journalist whose career spanned the mid-1930s to the early 1990s. He was associated for many years with ''The New York Times.''
Early life and educati ...
): "The test is 'whether the past is convincingly imagined and vividly evoked'. That is what Homero Aridjis accomplishes so brilliantly in this
phantasmagoric, luminous novel, The Lord of the Last Days: Visions of the Year 1000."
**
Giuseppe Bellini: "Through the two currents of his fiction, with historical background and futuristic themes, Aridjis has brought and is bringing a contribution to Hispano-American narrative which places him among the greatest authors of the 20th Century."
*''Moctezuma'':
**
Luis Buñuel
Luis Buñuel Portolés (; 22 February 1900 – 29 July 1983) was a Spanish and Mexican filmmaker who worked in France, Mexico and Spain. He has been widely considered by many film critics, historians and directors to be one of the greatest and ...
: "It's perfect. It's a very profound and strange play. I think the author is completely surrealist, which for me is great praise."
*''El último Adán'' (''The Last Adam'')":
**
Luis Buñuel
Luis Buñuel Portolés (; 22 February 1900 – 29 July 1983) was a Spanish and Mexican filmmaker who worked in France, Mexico and Spain. He has been widely considered by many film critics, historians and directors to be one of the greatest and ...
: "That the apocalypse will be the work of man and not of God is, for me, an absolute certainty. Therein lies the difference between the apocalyptic delirium of The Last Adam and Saint John's mediocre apocalyptic descriptions. Obviously, man's imagination has been enriched over the centuries."
*''Los invisibles'':
**
Alberto Manguel
Alberto Manguel (born March 13, 1948, in Buenos Aires) is an Argentine Canadian, Argentine-Canadian anthologist, translator, essayist, novelist, editor, and a former director of the National Library of Argentina. He is a cosmopolitan and polyglo ...
: "Contemporary literature in Spanish generally lacks the voluptuousness and richness evident in Los Invisibles. It too often chooses between exacerbated realism and a kind of free-for-all fantasy. Aridjis, on the contrary, can use all kinds of voice, showing absolute mastery in all, and an astonishing narrative virtuosity. If "Los Invisibles" had to claim a lineage, it would be that of
Voltaire
François-Marie Arouet (; 21 November 169430 May 1778), known by his ''Pen name, nom de plume'' Voltaire (, ; ), was a French Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment writer, philosopher (''philosophe''), satirist, and historian. Famous for his wit ...
's Contes philosophiques,
Umberto Eco
Umberto Eco (5 January 1932 – 19 February 2016) was an Italian Medieval studies, medievalist, philosopher, Semiotics, semiotician, novelist, cultural critic, and political and social commentator. In English, he is best known for his popular ...
's ''
Foucault's Pendulum
''Foucault's Pendulum'' (original title: ''Il pendolo di Foucault'' ) is a novel by Italian writer and philosopher Umberto Eco. It was first published in 1988, with an English translation by William Weaver being published a year later.
The bo ...
'' and (because of its literary humour)
Marcel Aymé
Marcel Aymé (; 29 March 1902 – 14 October 1967) was a French novelist and playwright, who also wrote screenplays and works for children.
Biography
Marcel André Aymé was born in Joigny, in the Burgundy region of France, the youngest ...
's "La tête des autres."
**
J. M. G. Le Clézio: "After reading the novel, I believe it will be impossible to walk the streets of Paris without feeling surrounded by invisibles forces."
*''Solar Poems'':
**
Yves Bonnefoy
Yves Jean Bonnefoy (24 June 1923, Tours – 1 July 2016, Paris) was a French poet and art historian. He also published a number of translations, most notably the plays of William Shakespeare which are considered among the best in French. He was a ...
: "A great flame passes through the words, the poetry of Homero Aridjis, who sets reality alight in images that at once illuminate and consume it, making life a sister of dream. Homero is a great poet; our century has great need of him." (Preface to "Les poemes solaires")
**
Quincy Troupe
Quincy Thomas Troupe, Jr. (born July 22, 1939) is an American poet, editor, journalist and professor emeritus at the University of California, San Diego, in La Jolla, California. He is best known as the biographer of Miles Davis, the jazz musi ...
: "Solar Poems" constantly serves up an exhilarating feast of wonderfully evocative images and metaphors that are also daring, cutting edge, full of surprises, often irreverent, historical, but sensual --- even erotic... Aridjis' poetry is full of love and a profound wonder for all of the universe and its inhabitants --- humans, animals, the earth, the seas, the sky and the sun and the moon. Solar Poems is a beautiful and necessary collection of poems by a wise poet at the peak of his powers."
*''News of the Earth'':
**
Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Robert Francis Kennedy Jr. (born January 17, 1954), also known by his initials RFK Jr., is an American politician, environmental lawyer, author, conspiracy theorist, and anti-vaccine activist serving as the 26th United States secretary of heal ...
: "Aridjis's new book covers more than thirty years of fighting to preserve our natural wonders. It will be an inspiration to future generations."
**
Jacob Scherr, NRDC: "Homero is one of the planet's great environmental heroes."
**
: "No one in Mexico has made a more important contribution to protecting the country's environment, an effort that has had ripple effects throughout the world."
**
Alejandro Jodorowsky
Alejandro Jodorowsky Prullansky (; born 17 February 1929) is a Chilean and French Experimental film, avant-garde filmmaker. Known for his films ''El Topo'' (1970), ''The Holy Mountain (1973 film), The Holy Mountain'' (1973) and ''Santa Sangre'' ...
: "The Group of 100 is a movement of conscience that strives to change our relationship with nature. Thanks to this group, presided over by the saintly poet Homero Aridjis, in our world we can still enjoy the magic of monarch butterflies, sea turtles and gray whales."
**
J.M.G. Le Clézio: "The great strength of Aridjis's work is the faith it transmits in a creative virtue of the world, pessimism notwithstanding, and in the possibility of saving it thanks to environmentalism. Aridjis's writings are not gratuitous; they are militant. Their source is the reality of the natural world."
**
Pierce Brosnan
Pierce Brendan Brosnan (born 16 May 1953) is an Irish actor and film producer. He was the fifth actor to play the fictional secret agent Portrayal of James Bond in film, James Bond in the List of James Bond films, James Bond film series, starri ...
: "Our journey together to visit those great gentle creatures
ray whaleswas one I will live with forever."
**
Serge Dedina, founder-director of Wildcoast:"''News of the Earth'' can be read as a chronicle of the history of environmental activism in Mexico, but its scope reaches beyond Mexico, as so many of the issues featured are shared with the United States and Canada, its North American partners in NAFTA, and the world...It is an invaluable contribution to understanding why we must preserve our global environment."
*''Smyrna in Flames:''
**
Stephanos Papadopoulos
Stephanos Papadopoulos (born 1976) is a Greek- American poet.
Biography
Stephanos Papadopoulos was born in North Carolina and raised in Paris and Athens
Athens ( ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Greece, large ...
: "
e book's power is unmistakable. It lies in its indelible images, and in the very fact that Homero Aridjis, named after the greatest poet of Ionia, returns to his own bloody history by rewriting his father's memoirs, by giving the dead a voice, by returning the story to its owners. It is a bleak, terrifying, undeniably moving accomplishment."
Environmental activism

Aridjis is increasingly renowned as one of Latin America's leading environmental activists. As a child, he would often walk up a hillside behind his village to watch the migrating
monarch butterflies
The monarch butterfly or simply monarch (''Danaus plexippus'') is a milkweed butterfly (subfamily Danainae) in the family Nymphalidae. Other common names, depending on region, include milkweed, common tiger, wanderer, and black-veined brown. ...
. As he grew older logging thinned the forest and his concern for the fate of the butterflies and the trees triggered his earliest public defense of the environment.
In March 1985 Aridjis founded and became president of the Group of 100, an association of prominent artists and intellectuals, including
Octavio Paz
Octavio Paz Lozano (March 31, 1914 – April 19, 1998) was a Mexican poet and diplomat. For his body of work, he was awarded the 1977 Jerusalem Prize, the 1981 Miguel de Cervantes Prize, the 1982 Neustadt International Prize for Literature, a ...
,
Juan Rulfo
Juan Nepomuceno Carlos Pérez Rulfo Vizcaíno, best known as Juan Rulfo (; 16 May 1917 – 7 January 1986), was a Mexican writer, screenwriter, and photographer. He is best known for two literary works, the 1955 novel ''Pedro Páramo'', and the ...
,
Rufino Tamayo
Rufino del Carmen Arellanes Tamayo (August 25, 1899 – June 24, 1991) was a Mexican painter of Zapotec peoples, Zapotec heritage, born in Oaxaca City, Oaxaca de Juárez, Mexico.Sullivan, 170-171Ades, 357 Tamayo was active in the mid-20th cen ...
,
Gabriel García Márquez
Gabriel José García Márquez (; 6 March 1927 – 17 April 2014) was a Colombian writer and journalist, known affectionately as Gabo () or Gabito () throughout Latin America. Considered one of the most significant authors of the 20th centur ...
,
Álvaro Mutis
Álvaro Mutis Jaramillo (August 25, 1923 – September 22, 2013) was a Colombian poet, novelist, and essayist. His best-known work is the novel sequence '' The Adventures and Misadventures of Maqroll'', which revolves around the character o ...
,
Augusto Monterroso
Augusto Monterroso Bonilla (December 21, 1921 – February 8, 2003) was a Honduran writer who adopted Guatemalan nationality, known for the ironical and humorous style of his short stories. He is considered an important figure in the Latin Amer ...
,
Francisco Toledo
Francisco Benjamín López Toledo (17 July 1940 – 5 September 2019) was a Mexican painter, sculptor, and graphic artist. In a career that spanned seven decades, Toledo produced thousands of works of art and became widely regarded as one of M ...
,
Leonora Carrington
Mary Leonora Carrington (6 April 191725 May 2011) was a British-born, naturalised Mexican Surrealist painter and novelist. She lived most of her adult life in Mexico City and was one of the last surviving participants in the Surrealist movem ...
,
Mathias Goeritz
Werner Mathias Goeritz Brunner (4 April 1915, Danzig, German Empire – 4 August 1990, Mexico City) was a Mexican painter and sculptor of German people, German origin. After spending much of the 1940s in North Africa and Spain, he and his wife, ...
,
Manuel Álvarez Bravo
Manuel Álvarez Bravo (February 4, 1902 – October 19, 2002) was a Mexican artistic photographer and one of the most important figures in 20th century Latin American photography. He was born and raised in Mexico City. While he took art classes ...
,
Elena Poniatowska
Hélène Elizabeth Louise Amélie Paula Dolores Poniatowska Amor (born May 19, 1932), known professionally as Elena Poniatowska (), is a French-born Mexican journalist and author, specializing in works on social and political issues focused on ...
and others, devoted to environmental protection and the defense of
biodiversity
Biodiversity is the variability of life, life on Earth. It can be measured on various levels. There is for example genetic variability, species diversity, ecosystem diversity and Phylogenetics, phylogenetic diversity. Diversity is not distribut ...
in Mexico and Latin America. Under his leadership the Group of 100 achieved in 1986 the official decree ensuring protection for the forests where the migratory monarch butterfly overwinters and in 1990 a permanent ban on the capture and commercialization of all seven species of
sea turtle
Sea turtles (superfamily Chelonioidea), sometimes called marine turtles, are reptiles of the order Testudines and of the suborder Cryptodira. The seven existing species of sea turtles are the flatback, green, hawksbill, leatherback, loggerh ...
in Mexico. The Group was able to thwart the building of
dam
A dam is a barrier that stops or restricts the flow of surface water or underground streams. Reservoirs created by dams not only suppress floods but also provide water for activities such as irrigation, human consumption, industrial use, aqua ...
s on the
Usumacinta River
The Usumacinta River (; named after the howler monkey) is a river in southeastern Mexico and northwestern Guatemala. It is formed by the junction of the Pasión River, which arises in the Sierra de Santa Cruz (in Guatemala) and the Salinas ...
that would have flooded 500 square kilometers of the
Lacandon forest and submerged important Mayan ruins. For five years Aridjis spearheaded the defense of
San Ignacio Lagoon
San Ignacio Lagoon () is a lagoon located in Mulegé Municipality of the Mexico, Mexican state of Baja California Sur, 59 kilometers (37 mi) from San Ignacio, Baja California Sur, San Ignacio, Mexico, and Mexican Federal Highway 1, Highway 1. It is ...
, the
gray whale
The gray whale (''Eschrichtius robustus''), also known as the grey whale,Britannica Micro.: v. IV, p. 693. is a baleen whale that migrates between feeding and breeding grounds yearly. It reaches a length of , a weight of up to and lives between ...
nursery in
Baja California
Baja California, officially the Free and Sovereign State of Baja California, is a state in Mexico. It is the northwesternmost of the 32 federal entities of Mexico. Before becoming a state in 1952, the area was known as the North Territory of B ...
, successfully preventing
Mitsubishi
The is a group of autonomous Japanese multinational companies in a variety of industries.
Founded by Yatarō Iwasaki in 1870, the Mitsubishi Group traces its origins to the Mitsubishi zaibatsu, a unified company that existed from 1870 to 194 ...
and the Mexican government from building the world's largest solar salt works at the lagoon. Thanks to Aridjis and the Group of 100 the government agreed to publish daily reports of
air quality
Air pollution is the presence of substances in the Atmosphere of Earth, air that are harmful to humans, other living beings or the environment. Pollutants can be Gas, gases like Ground-level ozone, ozone or nitrogen oxides or small particles li ...
in Mexico City,
leaded gasoline
Gasoline (North American English) or petrol (Commonwealth English) is a petrochemical product characterized as a transparent, yellowish, and flammable liquid normally used as a fuel for spark-ignited internal combustion engines. When formulate ...
was phased out and
lead
Lead () is a chemical element; it has Chemical symbol, symbol Pb (from Latin ) and atomic number 82. It is a Heavy metal (elements), heavy metal that is density, denser than most common materials. Lead is Mohs scale, soft and Ductility, malleabl ...
content in
pottery
Pottery is the process and the products of forming vessels and other objects with clay and other raw materials, which are fired at high temperatures to give them a hard and durable form. The place where such wares are made by a ''potter'' is al ...
drastically reduced, construction of an airport extension which would have obliterated a bird and
wildlife sanctuary
A nature reserve (also known as a wildlife refuge, wildlife sanctuary, biosphere reserve or bioreserve, natural or nature preserve, or nature conservation area) is a protected area of importance for flora, fauna, funga, or features of geolog ...
in
Lake Texcoco
Lake Texcoco (; ) was a natural saline lake within the ''Anahuac'' or Valley of Mexico. Lake Texcoco is best known for an island situated on the western side of the lake where the Mexica built the city of Mēxihco Tenōchtitlan, which would la ...
was halted, thousands of tons of
powdered milk
Powdered milk, also called milk powder, dried milk, or dry milk, is a manufactured dairy product made by evaporating milk to dryness. One purpose of drying milk is to preserve it; milk powder has a far longer shelf life than liquid milk and do ...
contaminated by
fallout
Nuclear fallout is residual radioactive material that is created by the reactions producing a nuclear explosion. It is initially present in the radioactive cloud created by the explosion, and "falls out" of the cloud as it is moved by the ...
from
Chernobyl
Chernobyl, officially called Chornobyl, is a partially abandoned city in Vyshhorod Raion, Kyiv Oblast, Ukraine. It is located within the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, to the north of Kyiv and to the southwest of Gomel in neighbouring Belarus. ...
were returned to Ireland before they could be distributed in Mexico and a program limiting the circulation of cars in Mexico City one day each week was put into practice by the city government.
In 1991 he conceived of, organized and presided over the first "
Morelia
Morelia (; from 1545 to 1828 known as Valladolid; Otomi language, Otomi: ) is a city and municipal seat of the municipalities of Mexico, municipality of Morelia in the north-central part of the state of Michoacán in central Mexico. It is both th ...
Symposium: Approaching the Year 2000", an international gathering of more than 40 prominent writers, scientists, environmentalists and representatives of indigenous peoples, to discuss the state of the planet and to establish a network for international cooperation. Among the participants were
J. M. G. Le Clézio,
Sherwood Rowland,
Petra Kelly
Petra Karin Kelly (29 November 1947 – 1 October 1992) was a German Green politician and ecofeminist activist. She was a founding member of the German Green Party, the first Green party to rise to prominence both nationally in Germany and w ...
,
Gert Bastian
Gert Bastian (26 March 1923 – 1 October 1992) was a German military officer and politician with the German Green Party.
Biography
Born in Munich, Bastian volunteered for the Wehrmacht in 1941, at the age of nineteen. In World War II he serve ...
,
Peter Raven
Peter Hamilton Raven (born June 13, 1936) is an American botanist and environmentalist, notable as the longtime director, now President Emeritus, of the Missouri Botanical Garden.
Early life
On June 13, 1936, Raven was born in Shanghai, China, ...
,
Lester Brown
Lester Russel Brown (born March 28, 1934) is an American environmental analyst, founder of the Worldwatch Institute, and founder and former president of the Earth Policy Institute, a nonprofit research organization based in Washington, D.C. BBC ...
, and
Augusto Roa Bastos
Augusto Roa Bastos (13 June 1917 – 26 April 2005) was a Paraguayan novelist and short story writer. As a teenager he fought in the Chaco War between Paraguay and Bolivia, and he later worked as a journalist, screenwriter and professor. ...
.
In 1992 he presented the Morelia Declaration, a statement on the environment signed by more than 1000 writers and scientists from 66 countries, at the Earth Summit in
Rio de Janeiro
Rio de Janeiro, or simply Rio, is the capital of the Rio de Janeiro (state), state of Rio de Janeiro. It is the List of cities in Brazil by population, second-most-populous city in Brazil (after São Paulo) and the Largest cities in the America ...
, where he spoke at the Global Forum with the
Dalai Lama
The Dalai Lama (, ; ) is the head of the Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism. The term is part of the full title "Holiness Knowing Everything Vajradhara Dalai Lama" (圣 识一切 瓦齐尔达喇 达赖 喇嘛) given by Altan Khan, the first Shu ...
,
Petra Kelly
Petra Karin Kelly (29 November 1947 – 1 October 1992) was a German Green politician and ecofeminist activist. She was a founding member of the German Green Party, the first Green party to rise to prominence both nationally in Germany and w ...
,
Tom Hayden
Thomas Emmet Hayden (December 11, 1939October 23, 2016) was an American social and political activist, author, and politician. Hayden was best known for his role as an anti-war, civil rights, and intellectual activist in the 1960s, becoming an i ...
,
Ted Turner
Robert Edward Turner III (born November 19, 1938) is an American entrepreneur, television producer, media proprietor, and Philanthropy, philanthropist. He founded the CNN, Cable News Network (CNN), the first 24-hour United States cable news, ...
and
Jane Fonda
Jane Seymour Fonda (born December 21, 1937) is an American actress and activist. Recognized as a film icon, Jane Fonda filmography, Fonda's work spans several genres and over six decades of film and television. She is the recipient of List of a ...
, among others.
In 1994 he organized and presided over the second "Morelia Symposium: Approaching the Year 2000". Among the participants were
J. M. G. Le Clézio,
Rita Dove
Rita Frances Dove (born August 28, 1952) is an American poet and essayist. From 1993 to 1995, she served as United States Poet Laureate, Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress. She is the first African American to have bee ...
,
Kjell Espmark
Kjell Erik Espmark (19 February 1930 – 18 September 2022) was a Swedish writer, literary historian, member of the Swedish Academy, and Professor of the History of Literature at Stockholm University. He was elected to the Swedish Academy on 5 M ...
,
Bärbel Bohley
Bärbel Bohley (24 May 1945 – 11 September 2010) was an East German opposition figure and artist.
Biography
As an artist, Bohley won prizes from the authorities, including a trip to the Soviet Union. Her opposition to the government did not ...
,
Bei Dao
Bei Dao (, born August 2, 1949) is the pen name of the Chinese-American writer Zhao Zhenkai (). Among the most acclaimed Chinese-language poets of his generation, he is often regarded as a candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature. In addition ...
,
W. S. Merwin,
John Ralston Saul
John Ralston Saul (born June 19, 1947) is a Canadian writer, political philosopher, and public intellectual. Saul is most widely known for his writings on the nature of individualism, citizenship and the public good; the failures of manager-l ...
,
Bill McKibben
William Ernest McKibben (born December 8, 1960)"Bill Ernest McKibben." ''Environmental Encyclopedia''. Edited by Deirdre S. Blanchfield. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Gale, 2009. Retrieved via ''Biography in Context'' database, December 31, 2017. is a ...
and Breyten Breytenbach. The Second Morelia Declaration was presented at the United Nations International Conference on Population and Development in
Cairo
Cairo ( ; , ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Egypt and the Cairo Governorate, being home to more than 10 million people. It is also part of the List of urban agglomerations in Africa, largest urban agglomeration in Africa, L ...
in 1994. Aridjis obtained funding for both meetings from the Rockefeller Foundation.
In 2000 he organized and presided over "The Earth in the Year 2000", a joint International PEN—UNESCO symposium of writers and scientists in alliance for sustainable development.
As a pioneer of Mexican
civil society
Civil society can be understood as the "third sector" of society, distinct from government and business, and including the family and the private sphere.[Michoacán Institute of Culture
Michoacán, formally Michoacán de Ocampo, officially the Free and Sovereign State of Michoacán de Ocampo, is one of the 31 states which, together with Mexico City, compose the Federal Entities of Mexico. The state is divided into 113 municipa ...]
, and as its Director General held an historic international poetry festival, established public libraries throughout the state, founded Mexico's first Museum of Mexican Masks, oversaw restoration of historical buildings, the recovery and restoration of colonial art, protection of cultural heritage, and promotion of cultural diversity in traditional celebrations throughout the state of Michoacán.
Besides the Morelia (Michoacan) Festival in 1981, Aridjis also organized and presided over two international poetry festivals in Mexico City, in 1982 and 1987, bringing to Mexico poets such as
Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo ( ; ; 24 August 1899 – 14 June 1986) was an Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator regarded as a key figure in Spanish literature, Spanish-language and international literatur ...
,
Seamus Heaney
Seamus Justin Heaney (13 April 1939 – 30 August 2013) was an Irish Irish poetry, poet, playwright and translator. He received the 1995 Nobel Prize in Literature. Among his best-known works is ''Death of a Naturalist'' (1966), his first m ...
,
Günter Grass
Günter Wilhelm Grass (; 16 October 1927 – 13 April 2015) was a German novelist, poet, playwright, illustrator, graphic artist, sculptor, and recipient of the 1999 Nobel Prize in Literature.
He was born in the Free City of Danzig (now Gda ...
,
Vasko Popa
Vasile "Vasko" Popa ( sr-Cyrl, Васко Попа; 29 June 1922 – 5 January 1991) was a Yugoslav and Serbian poet of Romanian ethnicity.
Biography
Popa was born in the village of Grebenac (), Yugoslavia (present-day Serbia) into a Banat ...
,
Allen Ginsberg
Irwin Allen Ginsberg (; June 3, 1926 – April 5, 1997) was an American poet and writer. As a student at Columbia University in the 1940s, he began friendships with Lucien Carr, William S. Burroughs and Jack Kerouac, forming the core of th ...
,
Kazuko Shiraishi
was a Japanese poet and translator who was born in Vancouver, British Columbia
Vancouver is a major city in Western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populo ...
,
Ted Hughes
Edward James Hughes (17 August 1930 – 28 October 1998) was an English poet, translator, and children's writer. Critics frequently rank him as one of the best poets of his generation and one of the twentieth century's greatest writers. He wa ...
,
Lawrence Ferlinghetti
Lawrence Monsanto Ferlinghetti (March 24, 1919 – February 22, 2021) was an American poet, painter, social activist, and co-founder of City Lights Booksellers & Publishers. An author of poetry, translations, fiction, theatre, art criticism, and ...
,
Andrei Voznesensky
Andrei Andreyevich Voznesensky (, 12 May 1933 – 1 June 2010) was a Soviet and Russian poet and writer who had been referred to by Robert Lowell as "one of the greatest living poets in any language." He was one of the "Children of the '60s ...
,
João Cabral de Melo Neto
João Cabral de Melo Neto (January 6, 1920 – October 9, 1999) was a Brazilian poet and diplomat, and one of the most influential writers in late Brazilian modernism. He was awarded the 1990 Camões Prize and the 1992 Neustadt International Pri ...
,
Katerina Anghelaki-Rooke,
Lars Forssell
Lars Hans Carl Abraham Forssell (14 January 192826 July 2007) was a Swedish writer and member of the Swedish Academy. Forssell was a versatile writer who worked within many genres, including poetry, drama and songwriting. He was awarded the Bell ...
,
Marin Sorescu
Marin Sorescu (; 29 February 1936 – 8 December 1996) was a Romanian poet, playwright, and novelist.
His works were translated into more than 20 countries, and the total number of his books that were published abroad rises up to 60 books. He h ...
,
Tadeusz Różewicz,
André du Bouchet
André — sometimes transliterated as Andre — is the French and Portuguese language, Portuguese form of the name Andrew and is now also used in the English-speaking world. It used in France, Quebec, Canada and other French language, French-spe ...
, Eliseo Diego,
Mazisi Kunene,
Günter Kunert
Günter Kunert (; 6 March 1929 – 21 September 2019) was a German writer. Based in East Berlin, he published poetry from 1947, supported by Bertold Brecht. After he had signed a petition against the deprivation of the citizenship of Wolf Bierman ...
,
Breyten Breytenbach
Breyten Breytenbach (; 16 September 193924 November 2024) was a South African writer, poet, and painter. He became internationally well-known as a dissident poet and vocal critic of South Africa under apartheid, and as a political prisoner of ...
,
W. S. Merwin,
Rita Dove
Rita Frances Dove (born August 28, 1952) is an American poet and essayist. From 1993 to 1995, she served as United States Poet Laureate, Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress. She is the first African American to have bee ...
and
Paul Muldoon
Paul Muldoon is an Irish poet. He has published more than thirty collections and won a Pulitzer Prize for Poetry and the T. S. Eliot Prize. At Princeton University he has been both the Howard G. B. Clark '21 University Professor in the Humani ...
.
In 1997, a coalition of seventeen centers led by American, Japan, Swedish and Belgian (Dutch-speaking) PEN nominated Aridjis for International President of the worldwide association of writers, and he was elected President at the International PEN Congress in
Edinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...
, winning a second three-year term at the Moscow Congress held in 2000. He is the first PEN President living in Latin America. During his presidency he oversaw a complete revision of PEN's constitution, achieved acceptance of Spanish as PEN's third official language and led the organization in bettering its governance and accountability. In 2003 he was elected International PEN President Emeritus.
From April 2007 until the abolition of the post in January 2010 he was Mexico's ambassador to UNESCO, where he was a staunch defender of human rights, freedom of expression and cultural diversity and an outspoken critic of lack of transparency and accountability in the UNESCO bureaucracy.
While Aridjis was Mexico's ambassador to UNESCO, he was the driving force behind UNESCO's decision to name Mexico's
Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve
The Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve () is a World Heritage Site containing most of the overwintering sites of the eastern population of the monarch butterfly. The reserve is located in the Trans-Mexican Volcanic Belt pine-oak forests ecoregi ...
a UN
World Heritage Site
World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...
.
Teaching activities
*Visiting professor, Indiana University, Bloomington, 1969.
*Visiting professor, New York University, 1969-1971.
*Visiting professor and writer-in-residence, Columbia University, 1979-1980.
*Nichols Chair in Humanities and the Public Sphere at the University of California, Irvine, 2002.
*Poetry workshop at the Social Security Institute in Mexico City from 1986-1988.
*Inaugural J.H. Tans Lecture,
University of Limburg
Maastricht University (abbreviated as UM; ) is a public research university in Maastricht, Netherlands. Founded in 1976, it is the second youngest of the thirteen Dutch universities.
In 2023, 22,976 students studied at Maastricht University, 59% ...
,
Maastricht
Maastricht ( , , ; ; ; ) is a city and a Municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the southeastern Netherlands. It is the capital city, capital and largest city of the province of Limburg (Netherlands), Limburg. Maastricht is loca ...
, The Netherlands, 1991.
*Cecil Green Distinguished Visiting Professor,
University of British Columbia
The University of British Columbia (UBC) is a Public university, public research university with campuses near University of British Columbia Vancouver, Vancouver and University of British Columbia Okanagan, Kelowna, in British Columbia, Canada ...
, Vancouver, Canada, 1993.
*Professor, "The Contemporary Novel" at Salzburg Seminar Session 354,
Salzburg
Salzburg is the List of cities and towns in Austria, fourth-largest city in Austria. In 2020 its population was 156,852. The city lies on the Salzach, Salzach River, near the border with Germany and at the foot of the Austrian Alps, Alps moun ...
, Austria.
*Writer-in-Residence, The Sweet Briar Seminars 1999-2000 International Writers,
Sweet Briar College
Sweet Briar College is a Private college, private Women's colleges in the United States, women's liberal arts college in Sweet Briar, Amherst County, Virginia, Amherst County, Virginia. It was established in 1901 by Indiana Fletcher Williams in ...
,
Sweet Briar, Virginia
Sweet Briar College is a private women's liberal arts college in Sweet Briar, Amherst County, Virginia. It was established in 1901 by Indiana Fletcher Williams in memory of her deceased daughter, Daisy. The college formally opened its doors i ...
.
*Professor, Bennington Writing Seminar,
Bennington College
Bennington College is a private liberal arts college in Bennington, Vermont, United States. Founded as a women’s college in 1932, ,
Vermont
Vermont () is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders Massachusetts to the south, New Hampshire to the east, New York (state), New York to the west, and the Provinces and territories of Ca ...
, 2002.
*Rachel Carson Distinguished Lecture,
Florida Gulf Coast University
Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU) is a public university in Lee County, Florida, near Fort Myers. It is part of the State University System of Florida and is its second-youngest member. The university was established on May 3, 1991, and is acc ...
,
Fort Myers, Florida
Fort Myers (or Ft. Myers) is a city in and the county seat of Lee County, Florida, United States. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 86,395; it was estimated to have grown to 95,949 in 2022, making it the List o ...
, 2007.
Awards and honors
As a writer:
*Fellowship from the Mexican Writers' Center (1959–60)
*Xavier Villaurrutia Prize for best book of the year, for Mirándola dormir (1965)
*Chosen by
Henry Kissinger
Henry Alfred Kissinger (May 27, 1923 – November 29, 2023) was an American diplomat and political scientist who served as the 56th United States secretary of state from 1973 to 1977 and the 7th National Security Advisor (United States), natio ...
to take part in the International Seminar for Politics and Humanities,
Harvard University
Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...
, 1966.
*John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship (1966–1967 and 1979–1980)
*French government fellowship (1966–1968)
*Guest of the Berliner Kunstlerprogramm of the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst in
West Berlin
West Berlin ( or , ) was a political enclave which comprised the western part of Berlin from 1948 until 1990, during the Cold War. Although West Berlin lacked any sovereignty and was under military occupation until German reunification in 1 ...
(1986 and 1988)
*Diana-Novedades Prize for ''Memorias del Nuevo Mundo'', for the outstanding novel in Spanish (1988)
*Grinzane Cavour Prize for ''1492, Vida y Tiempos de Juan Cabezón de Castilla'', best foreign novel translated into Italian, 1992
*''1492: Life and Times of Juan Cabezón of Castile'', New York Times Notable Book of the Year
*Doctor Honoris Causa in Humanities, Indiana University (1993)
*Residency at the Rockefeller Foundation's Bellagio Study and Conference Center,
Bellagio, Italy
Bellagio (; ) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Como in the Lombardy region of Italy. It is situated on Lake Como, known also by its Latin name ''Lario'', where the lake's two southern arms branch, creating the ''Triangolo larian ...
. (1994 & 2010)
*Festival de Poesía Ramón López Velarde,
Zacatecas, Mexico, held in his honor, 1995
*Prix Roger Caillois for the ensemble of his work as a poet and novelist, France (1997)
*Smederevo Golden Key for Poetry, Serbia (2002)
*First Erendira State Prize for the Arts, Michoacán, Mexico (2005)
*Premio Internazionale di Poesia 2013, Premio Letterario Camaiore, Italy
*Premio Internazionale di Poesía Elena Violani Landi, Centro di Poesia Contemporanea, University of Bologna (2016)
*Premio Letterario Internazionale L'Aquila Laudomia Bonanni, Italy (2019).
*Griffin Poetry Prize, Canada (2024)
*Emeritus Member, National System of Creative Artists, Mexico, since 1999
*Honorary member, Hellenic Authors Society
As an environmentalist:
*Global 500 Award from the United Nations Environment Program on behalf of the Group of 100
*''Latin Trade'' magazine's Environmentalist of the Year
*José Maria Morelos Medal, the state of Michoacan's highest award
*John Hay Award from the Orion Society "for significant achievement in writing that addresses the relationship between people and nature", bestowed during a colloquium of writers and scientists in the
Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve
The Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve () is a World Heritage Site containing most of the overwintering sites of the eastern population of the monarch butterfly. The reserve is located in the Trans-Mexican Volcanic Belt pine-oak forests ecoregi ...
in Mexico.
*Natural Resources Defense Council Force for Nature Award
*Green Cross Millennium Prize for International Environmental Leadership, given by Mikhail Gorbachev and Global Green (also awarded to his wife, Betty Ferber)
*Pax Natura Foundation Award
Bibliography
English
*''Blue Spaces''/''Los espacios azules'', Selected Poems of Homero Aridjis, edited with an Introduction by Kenneth Rexroth, The Seabury Press, 1974
*''Exaltation of Light'', Boa Editions, 1981 (translated by Eliot Weinberger)
*''Persephone'', Aventura/Vintage Books, 1986 (translated by Betty Ferber)
*''1492: The Life and Times of Juan Cabezón of Castile'', Summit Books, 1991 (translated by Betty Ferber)
*''The Lord of the Last Days: Visions of the Year 1000'', William Morrow, 1995 (translated by Betty Ferber)
*''Eyes to See Otherwise''/''Ojos de otro mirar'', selected and edited by Betty Ferber and George McWhirter, Carcanet, 2001, New Directions, 2002 (translated by Philip Lamantia, Kenneth Rexroth, W. S. Merwin, Jerome Rothenberg, George McWhirter, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Eliot Weinberger)
*''Solar Poems''/''Los poemas solares'', City Lights Publishers, 2010, English and Spanish (translated by George McWhirter)
*''Time of Angels''/''Tiempo de ángeles'', City Lights Publishers, 2012 English and Spanish (translated by George McWhirter)
*''An Angel Speaks'', The Swedenborg Society, London, 2015.
*''The Child Poet'', Archipelago Books, New York, 2016 (translated by Chloe Aridjis).
*''Maria the Monarch'', Mandel Vilar Press, Simsbury, CT, 2017 (translated by Eva Aridjis).
*''News of the Earth'', Mandel Vilar Press, Simsbury, CT, 2017 (edited and translated by Betty Ferber).
*Contributor to ''A New Divan: Lyrical Dialogue Between East and West'', Gingko Library 2019.
*''Smyrna in Flames'', Mandel Vilar Press, Simsbury, CT, and Dryad Press, Takoma Park, MD, 2021 (translated by Lorna Scott Fox)
*''Self-Portrait in the Zone of Silence'', New Directions, 2023 (translated by George McWhirter).
Spanish
Poetry
*''Los ojos desdoblados'', Ed. La Palabra, Mexico, 1960.
*''Antes del reino'', Ed. Era, Mexico, 1963.
*''Mirándola dormir'', Ed. Joaquín Mortiz, Mexico, 1964.
*''Perséfone'', Ed. Joaquín Mortiz, 1967.
*''Ajedrez-Navegaciones'', Ed. Siglo XXI, Mexico, 1969.
*''Los espacios azules'', Ed. Joaquín Mortiz, Mexico, 1969.
*''Quemar las naves'', Ed. Joaquín Mortiz, Mexico, 1975.
*''Vivir para ver'', Ed. Joaquín Mortiz, Mexico, 1977.
*''Construir la muerte'', Ed. Joaquín Mortiz, Mexico, 1982.
*''Imágenes para el fin del milenio & Nueva expulsión del paraíso'', Ed. Joaquín Mortiz, Mexico, 1990.
*''El poeta en peligro de extinción'', Ediciones El Tucán de Virginia, Mexico, 1992.
*''Tiempo de ángeles'', Espejo de Obsidiana, Mexico, 1994. English translation, ''Time of Angels'', City Lights Publishers, San Francisco, 2012.
*''Ojos de otro mirar'', Ediciones El Tucán de Virginia, Mexico, 1998.
*''El ojo de la ballena'', Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 2001.
*''Los poemas solares'', Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 2005. English translation, ''Solar Poems'', City Lights Publishers, San Francisco, 2010.
*''Diario de sueños'', Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 2011.
*''Del cielo y sus maravillas, de la tierra y sus miserias'', Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 2013.
*''Esmirna en llamas'', Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, DF, 2013
*''La poesía llama'', Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 2018.
Novels
*''La tumba de Filidor'', Ed. La Palabra, Mexico, 1961.
*''El poeta niño'', Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 1971.
*''El encantador solitario'', Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 1972.
*''1492 vida y tiempos de Juan Cabezón de Castilla'', Ed. Siglo XXI, Mexico, 1985.
*''Memorias del nuevo mundo'', Editorial Diana, Mexico, 1988.
*''La leyenda de los soles'', Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 1993.
*''El señor de los últimos días'': Visiones del año mil,
Alfaguara
Alfaguara is a Spanish-language publishing house that serves markets in Hispanic America, Spain and the United States. It was founded by the Spanish writer and Nobel Prize winner Camilo José Cela.
History and profile
Alfaguara was establishe ...
, Mexico, 1994.
*''¿En quién piensas cuando haces el amor?'', Alfaguara, Mexico, 1996.
*''La montaña de las mariposas'', Alfaguara, Mexico, 2000.
*''La zona del silencio'', Alfaguara, Mexico, 2002.
*''El hombre que amaba el sol'', Alfaguara, Mexico, 2005.
*''Sicarios'', Alfaguara, Mexico, 2007.
*''Los invisibles'', Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 2010.
*''Los perros del fin del mundo'', Alfaguara, Mexico, 2012.
*''Esmirna en llamas'', Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 2013.
*''Ciudad de zombis'', Alfaguara, Mexico, 2014
*''Carne de Dios'', Alfaguara, Mexico, 2015.
*''Los peones son el alma del juego'', Alfaguara, Mexico, 2021.
Short fiction
*''Noche de independencia'', Ed. Ultramar, Salvat, Madrid, 1978.
*''Playa nudista y otros relatos'', Ed. Argos Vergara, Barcelona, 1982.
*''La Santa Muerte'', Alfaguara, Mexico, 2004.
Drama
*''Espectáculo del año dos mil y Moctezuma'', Ed. Joaquín Mortiz, México, 1981.
*''El último Adán'', Ed. Joaquín Mortiz, México, 1986.
*''Gran teatro del fin del mundo'', Joaquín Mortiz, México, 1989.
Non-fiction
*''Apocalipsis con figuras'', Taurus, Mexico, 1997.
*''Noticias de la Tierra'', with Betty Ferber, Random House Mondadori, Mexico, 2012.
*''Testamento del dragón'', Alfaguara Penguin Random House, Mexico, 2018.
*''El nuevo Apocalipsis'', Editorial Verbum, Madrid, 2020.
Children's books
*''El silencio de Orlando'', Alfaguara Infantil, Mexico, 2000, Ediciones Castillo, Mexico, 2015.
*''El día de los perros locos'', Alfguara Infantil, Mexico, 2003.
*''El tesoro de la noche triste (Vuelven los perros locos)'', Alfaguara Infantil, Mexico, 2005.
*''La búsqueda de Archelon: Odisea de las siete tortugas'', Alfaguara, Mexico, 2006.
*''María la monarca'', Ediciones Castillo, Mexico, 2015.
Poetry anthologies
*''Antología'', Ed. Lumen, Barcelona, 1976.
*''Antología poética'', Ocnos Editores, Barcelona, 1976.
*''Sobre una ausencia'', Akal Editor, Madrid, 1977.
*''Obra poética 1960-1986'', Ed. Joaquín Mortiz, Mexico, 1987.
*''Obra poética 1960-1990'', Ed. Joaquín Mortiz, Mexico, 1991.
*''Antologia poetica 1960-1994'', Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 1994.
*''Ojos de otro mirar: Poesía 1960-2001'', Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 2002.
*''Infancia de luz'', Ediciones SM, Mexico, 2003.
*''Antología poética'', Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 2009.
*''Antología poética, 1960-2018'', Ediciones Cátedra, Madrid, 2018.
Critical anthologies
*''Poesía en movimiento: México 1915-66'', Ed. Siglo XXI, México, 1966, with Octavio Paz, Alí Chumacero and Jose Emilio Pacheco.
*''330 grabados originales de Manuel Manilla, Homero Aridjis y Arsacio Vanegas Arroyo'', Editorial A. Vanegas Arroyo, Mexico, 1971.
*''Seis poetas latinoamericanos de hoy'', Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, New York, 1972.
*''New Poetry of Mexico'', E.H. Dutton, New York, 1972; Secker and Warburg, London, 1974.
*''Heimwee naar de dood: Zeven Mexicaanse dichters van deze eeuw'', Meulenhoff, Amsterdam, 1974.
*''Savremena poezija Meksika'', Bagdala, Belgrade, 1976.
*''Snabbare an tanken ror sig bilden: Modern Mexikansk poesi'', with Pierre Zekeli, Fibs Lyrikklubs, Stockholm, 1979.
*''Antología del Primer Festival Internacional de Poesía'', Morelia 1981, Ed. Joaquín Mortiz, Mexico 1982.
*''Antología del Festival Internacional de Poesía de la Ciudad de México'', El Tucán de Virginia, Mexico, 1988.
*''Artistas e intelectuales sobre el Ecocidio Urbano'', with Fernando Cesarman, Consejo de la Crónica de la Ciudad de México, Mexico, 1989.
Recordings
*Recording of his poetry for the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., 1966.
*The World's Greatest Poets Reading at the Festival of Two Worlds, Spoleto, Italy, Spanish Poets, Volume I, Applause Productions, Inc., New York, 1968.
*''Homero Aridjis: antología poética'', ''
Voz Viva de México'', UNAM, Mexico, 1969.
*Poetry International 1973,
Rotterdamse Kunststichting
The Rotterdamse Kunststichting RKS (''Rotterdam Arts Council'') was an independent foundation to promote art and culture in Rotterdam from 1945 to 2005. In 2005 the foundation merged into the Rotterdam Council for Art and Culture, an advisory body ...
, Rotterdam, 1973.
*''Homero Aridjis: Ojos de otro mirar'', Entre voces, Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 2003.
* Recording of his poetry and prose for the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., 2024.
Further reading
*''Literatura y Ecologismo En Homero Aridjis: Una Luz Entre Ruinas'', de Gruyter, 2024
*''Edenes subvertidos. La obra en prosa de Homero Aridjis'', Laurence Pagacz, Bonilla Artigas, 2018
*''I tempi dell'apocalisse. L'opera di Homero Aridjis'', Giuseppe Bellini, Bulzoni, 2013
*''Latin American Novels of the Conquest: Reinventing the New World''/Kimberle S. Lopez, University of Missouri Press, 2002
*''El deseo colonial en 1492 y Memorias del Nuevo Mundo de Homero Aridjis''/Kimberle s. Lopez, read at the Sexto Congreso de Literatura Mexicana Contemporánea, El Paso, Texas, March 1–4, 2001.
*''La luz queda en el aire'', Estudios internacionales en torno a Homero Aridjis, ed. Thomas Stauder. Vervuert Verlag, 2005
*''Mexico in the 21st century: selected essays''/Alina Camacho Rivero de Gingerich., 2003
*''Actualización de temas precolombinos en tres poetas contemporaneos Mexicanos''/María Socorro Tabuenca Córdoba., 1979
*''Homero Aridjis: neoliberalismo y ficción narrativa en En quién piensas cuando haces el amor?''/Stéphanie Valdés-Besson., 2005
*''El último Adán: Visión apocalíptica de la ciudad en la narrativa de Homero Aridjis'', Lucia Guerra, Contexto, vol. 6, No. 8, 2002
*''La fantasia milenarista de Homero Aridjis'', Summa crítica, Saul Yurkievich, Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 1997.
References
External links
*www.cervantesvirtual.com/portales/homero_aridjis/
*
*Biography from the international literature festival berli
Biography from the International Literature Festival BerlinGroup of 100Homero Aridjis' 2009 publication from City Lights, ''Solar Poems''"El último Adán: Visión apocalíptica de la ciudad en la narrativa de Homero Aridjis"Keynote Lecture: "The Birds, or My Life as a Writer and Environmentalist Activist"PEN International*
ttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/homero-aridjis/mexico-missing-students-protest_b_6203444.html We're Mad as Hell, and We're Not Going to Take It Anymorebr>
Last Call For Monarchs*
ttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/homero-aridjis/charlie-hebdo-pen-award_b_7208044.html Charlie Hebdo Deserves the PEN Award. Censorship Is Complicity.br>
Instead Of Trump's Wall, Let's Build A Border Of Solar Panels*https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/a-poet-of-mythologies-homero-aridjis-at-80/
Homero Aridjisrecorded at the Library of Congress for the Hispanic Division's audio literary archive on February 23, 1966.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Aridjis, Homero
1940 births
Living people
Mexican people of Greek descent
PEN International
Mexican male poets
Writers from Michoacán
Mexican environmentalists
Mexican columnists
Ambassadors of Mexico to the Netherlands
Ambassadors of Mexico to Switzerland
Mexican expatriates in France
Xavier Villaurrutia Award winners
20th-century Mexican writers
21st-century Mexican writers
20th-century Mexican novelists
21st-century Mexican novelists
20th-century Mexican poets
21st-century Mexican poets