Pitol, Sergio

▪ 2007

 Mexican writer Sergio Pitol traveled to the Spanish town of Alcalá de Henares in 2006 to receive the Cervantes Prize, the most prestigious literary award in the Spanish-speaking world. For a man who began his career with nearly three decades of service in Mexico's diplomatic corps—much of that time spent in Europe—the trip from his home in Mexico to Cervantes' birthplace must have seemed a relatively easy one.

      Pitol was born on March 18, 1933, in Puebla, Mex., into a family of Italian descent. His childhood was a difficult one, marked by his mother's death by drowning. He studied (1950–55) both literature and law at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City, and by 1960 he had begun working for Mexico's Ministry of Foreign Relations. Pitol served as a cultural attaché in Poland, Hungary, and France during the 1970s, traveled to Italy, the U.S.S.R., and China, and eventually became Mexico's ambassador to Czechoslovakia in the mid-1980s. He also taught at the University of Veracruz, Xalapa, Mex. (1966–77), and the University of Bristol, Eng. (1971–72), and translated literary works from English and Polish.

      He continued to write throughout his diplomatic career and became known for his short stories. Although his first published collection, Tiempo cercado (1959), received little notice, later works firmly established his reputation. Vals de Mefisto (1984) won the Xavier Villaurrutia Prize, one of Mexico's highest literary awards. Many of Pitol's stories drew heavily on his experiences during his extended periods of time outside Mexico and probed at length the meaning of identity.

      A vibrant formal experimentation also ran throughout much of Pitol's writing, especially his longer works. The novel El tañido de una flauta (1972), set in New York and Europe, played with cinematic conventions, while El desfile del amor (1984) used a murder mystery as a framework to experiment with narrative perspective. His more recent works were memoirs that pushed the boundaries of the genre. El arte de la fuga (1996) recounted Pitol's childhood, his experiences as a writer in Mexico during the 1950s and '60s, and his work as a diplomat, but it also included literary analysis (of books that Pitol found influential) and an examination of the ongoing uprising by the Zapatista National Liberation Army in Chiapas. His El mago de Viena (2005) was also classified as a memoir, and it encompassed discursive explorations of literature, a complicated narrative framework, and a month's worth of Pitol's diary, all part of his continuing reflection on a lifetime spent as one of Mexico's most internationally known writers.

J.E. Luebering

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▪ Mexican author

born March 18, 1933, Puebla, Mex.

 

 Mexican author, whose work drew heavily on his experiences from time spent abroad and probed at length the meaning of identity. He was the recipient of the 2005 Cervantes Prize.

      Pitol was born into a family of Italian descent. His childhood was a difficult one, marked by his mother's death by drowning. He studied both literature and law at the National Autonomous University of Mexico in Mexico City (1950–55), and by 1960 he had begun working for Mexico's Ministry of Foreign Relations. Pitol served as a cultural attaché in Poland, Hungary, and France during the 1970s, traveled to Italy, the U.S.S.R., and China, and eventually became Mexico's ambassador to Czechoslovakia in the mid-1980s. He taught at the University of Veracruz, Xalapa, Mex. (1966–77), and the University of Bristol, Eng. (1971–72), and translated literary works from English and Polish.

      Pitol wrote throughout his diplomatic career and became known for his short stories. Although his first published collection, Tiempo cercado (1959; “Corralled Time”), received little notice, later works firmly established his reputation. Vals de Mefisto (1984; “Dance of Mephisto”) won the Xavier Villaurrutia Prize, one of Mexico's highest literary awards.

      A vibrant formal experimentation also ran throughout much of Pitol's writing, especially his longer works. The novel El tañido de una flauta (1972; “The Twang of the Flute”), set in New York and Europe, played with cinematic conventions, while El desfile del amor (1984; “The Parade of Love”) used a murder mystery as a framework to experiment with narrative perspective. His later works included memoirs that pushed the boundaries of the genre. El arte de la fuga (1996; “The Art of Flight”) recounted Pitol's childhood, his experiences as a writer in Mexico during the 1950s and '60s, and his work as a diplomat, but it also included literary analysis of books that Pitol found influential and an examination of the ongoing uprising by the Zapatista National Liberation Army in Chiapas. His El mago de Viena (2005; “The Magician of Vienna”) was also classified as a memoir, and it encompassed discursive explorations of literature, a complicated narrative framework, and a month's worth of Pitol's diary, all part of his continuing reflection on a lifetime spent as one of Mexico's most internationally known writers. For his body of work, Pitol was awarded the 2005 Cervantes Prize, the most prestigious literary award in the Spanish-speaking world, which was presented to him in 2006.

J.E. Luebering

 

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