MEXICO CITY – Whatever they may have thought of his politics, anyone luckyenough to have conversed with author Carlos Fuentes couldn't helpbut be taken by his patrician good looks and his love affair withlanguage. I was struck by this the first time I met Fuentes at his MexicoCity home in 1989 following the publication of "ChristopherUnborn," his Orwellian story of the "Makesicko Seedy" capitalnarrated by a fetus. And I saw it again nearly two decades later over lunch in LosAngeles, where he was promoting the English version of his book"The Eagle's Throne," a satire on Mexico's revolutionary historyand political baggage. Fuentes, who died Tuesday at age 83, loved good food andconversation, perhaps most of all when served up together. Wordsspilled out of him like water, and he played with them like a childfrolicking in the sea. Unbeknownst to Fuentes, I was interviewing him for his obituary,which is an awkwardly common practice in journalism. We keepprepared obits of famous people on file. In most cases reportersdon't tell the subject, as I did not. I also never wrote the obit,but now I find I want to share a bit of the delightful afternoon inwhich we discussed life, art and politics over fish and white wineat the classic Water Grill with our spouses. Like Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Mario Vargas Llosa, Fuentesbelonged to a generation of Latin American writers who were bothliterary and political, author and social commentator. He was apublic intellectual. "I wear two hats," he said, likening himself to French authorHonore de Balzac in producing a combination of human comedy, acutesocial portraits and ghost stories. "The imagination exists andsocial commentary exists. They are not at war with each other." Though he dressed beautifully and lived well from London to NewYork to Mexico, his politics were left-of-center, supportive ofFidel Castro's Cuba early on and of the Sandinista revolution inNicaragua. That combination long ago prompted Mexican commentatorEnrique Krauze to dub him "the Guerrilla Dandy," and call him anintellectual lightweight next to the more conservative Mexicanthinker and Nobel laureate Octavio Paz. When Castro repressed writers and intellectuals, though, Fuentesspoke out against him. The son of a career diplomat, Fuentes grew up abroad and spokeEnglish like a native for having studied in the United States. Formany years, that branded him as too much of "a gringo" for manyMexicans, while in the States he was seen by many as anti-Americanfor his frequent disagreements with U.S. policy in Latin Americaand elsewhere. Indeed, he was often critical of U.S. governments and of a richcountry that he thought should attend to its poor, but he wasgenuinely fond of Americans and American culture. "To call me anti-American is like saying I am anti-Semitic becausemy wife is not Jewish," he said during the lunch in Los Angeles. "It is a stupendous lie, a calumny. I grew up in this country. WhenI was a little boy I shook the hand of Franklin Roosevelt and Ihaven't washed it since," he added with characteristic good humor."I'll never forget his smile. I had great respect for him and Iremember how he said that society grows from the bottom up. I hadgreat respect for the New Deal. "I went to school here. I read Faulkner, listened to jazz, sawAmerican movies. I get along very well with the gringos," said theauthor of "The Old Gringo." "But I oppose a North American who doesn't represent the Americans,like the sharpshooter Cheney," he said, in reference to the formervice president. Still he wore almost as a badge of honor the fact that he had oncebeen denied entry into the U.S. under the McCarren-Walter Act forpro-Communist sympathies. "I was in very good company. GarciaMarquez, Graham Greene, Iris Murdoch, of all people." Fuentes was elegant that day with silver hair and a dark blazer,his even more elegant wife, Silvia Lemus, at his side. The two hadsuffered double tragedy in their lives with the losses of twochildren under dark circumstances. But they didn't discuss theirlosses then and in public, at least, they always seemed committedto wringing the most out of life. Already by then many Mexicans had come to regard Fuentes as theircountry's greatest living author. He was often mentioned as alikely candidate for a Nobel Prize for Literature and he oftensaid, as he did with a smile that day, that his friend "Gabo,"Garcia Marquez, had his Nobel. He said he believed he had manybooks in him yet, and indeed he went on to write at least threemore novels. "If I thought I had already peaked, I wouldn't be sitting here.There's always another book in there," he said. A prolific writer, he told us he was stronger than when he was ayoung man. "When I began to write, I was anguished. The psychosisof the empty page. At my age, I know exactly what I am going to do.I sleep, I dream, I get up, I write." But he didn't always know where the writing would take him. "Iplan, but with some mystery." Leaving the restaurant after lunch, Fuentes stopped to read thedirectory of tenants at the stately office building. At 77, theauthor explained, he was always looking at names that might workfor new characters. I asked if he had a preference for any of his books. "They are allmy children. Maybe some are cross-eyed, but I love them all." ___ Marjorie Miller is AP Regional Editor for Latin America and theCaribbean based in Mexico City. The e-commerce company in China offers quality products such as NK Compound Fertilizer , China Tomato Fertilizer NPK, and more. For more , please visit Cotton Meal Fertilizer today!
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