About the Author
Carlos Fuentes, Mexico's most celebrated novelist and critic, was born in 1928. He spent his early years in Washington, D.C., where his father was a member of the diplomatic corps. As a teen he lived in Argentina and Chile, as well as in his native Mexico. He studied law at the School of Law, National University of Mexico

Photo courtesy of Royce Carlton, Inc.

and at the Institut des Hautes Etudes Internacionales, Geneva.

Fifteen novels by Mr. Fuentes have been published in the United States: The Death of Artemio Cruz, The Good Conscience, Where the Air is Clear, A Change of Skin, Aura, Terra Nostra, The Hydra Head, Distant Relations, The Old Gringo (a national bestseller in 1985 which was also made into a movie), Christopher Unborn (a national bestseller in 1989), The Campaign in 1991, Diana: The Goddess Who Hunts Alone in 1995, and The Crystal Frontier in 1997. His more recent books published in the United States include The Years With Laura Diaz (2000), Inez, (2002), and This I Believe: An A to Z of a Life, published in 2005.An English translation of his next book, The Eagle's Throne, will be published in the spring of 2006 in the UK. Among Mr. Fuentes' other works, Burnt Water, a collection of short stories, appeared in 1980, Myself with Others: Selected Essays, in 1988, Constancia and Other Stories for Virgins in 1990, The Orange Tree, 1994; and, in 1996, A New Time for Mexico, a work of political commentary.

Mr. Fuentes helped to produce and narrate a television series on the history of Spanish culture, "The Buried Mirror," which was also published as an illustrated book with the same title in 1992.

Mr. Fuentes served as Mexico's ambassador to France in 1975-77. He was the Simon Bolivar Professor of Latin American Studies, University of Cambridge, England, in 1986-87 and he inaugurated the Robert F. Kennedy Chair in Latin American Studies at Harvard in 1988. In the summer of 1992, the University of Madrid devoted an entire week to the study of his work. He has taught at the University of Pennsylvania, El Colegio Nacional in Mexico, and at Princeton, Dartmouth, Washington, Harvard, Cornell and Brown, where he is professor-at-large.

In 1978, Mr. Fuentes was awarded the Romulo Gallegos Prize in Caracas, Venezuela. He was the third writer to receive the award; earlier winners were Mario Vargas Llosa and Gabriel Garca Marquez. He was honored with the National Prize in Literature, Mexico's highest literary award, in 1984. In 1988, he received the Miguel de Cervantes Prize, the most prestigious award ever bestowed on a Spanish-language writer, conferred by King Juan Carlos of Spain. In 1999, he received the inaugural Latin Civilization Award bestowed by the French Academy and the Brazilian Academy in honor of his significant contributions to Latin civilization. He was also the recipient of France's Legion of Honor, Italy's Cavour Award, the Principe de Asturias Award of Spain and The Order of the Southern Cross of Brazil.

He is a member of the Colegio Nacional de Mexico, a Trustee of the New York Public Library where he was inducted as a Library Lion, a member of the Board of the Institute of National Strategy (Los Angeles) and a foreign honorary member of the Board of the American Academy of Art & Letters. He has also been a Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and a Fellow of the Humanities at the Council for the Humanities at Princeton University. He is founder of the Iberoamerican Forum, which brings together political, literary and business personalities of the Spanish and Portuguese-speaking worlds once a year. Recently, he was selected as Honorary President of the IV Centennial of the publication of Don Quijote in Spain.
Mr. Fuentes currently divides his time between Mexico City and London. He is married to the Mexican journalist Sylvia Lemus.

-Biography courtesy of Royce Carlton Inc.