Juan García Ponce (22 September 1932 – 27 December 2003) was a Mexican novelist, short-story writer, essayist, translator and critic of Mexican art.

Juan García Ponce
García Ponce in 1981
García Ponce in 1981
Born(1932-09-22)22 September 1932
Mérida, Yucatán, Mexico
Died27 December 2003(2003-12-27) (aged 71)
Mexico City, Mexico
Occupation
  • Novelist
  • short-story writer
  • essayist
  • translator
Period1954–2012
Literary movementGeneración de la Ruptura

Career

edit

García Ponce was born in Mérida, Yucatán, Mexico. His most notable works include La aparición de lo invisible (1968) and Las huellas de la voz (1982). In his novels Figura de paja (1964), La casa en la playa (1966), La presencia lejana (1968), La cabaña (1969), La invitación (1972), El nombre olvidado (1970), El libro (1978), Crónica de la intervención (1982), Inmaculada o los placeres de la Inocencia (1989) he intertwines the erotic with philosophic rigor and the aesthetic, illuminating the secret, demonic side of reality, accepting all of its risks.[1]

He formed an important part of the Generación de Medio Siglo, or the Generación de la Ruptura, along with writers such as Salvador Elizondo, Inés Arredondo, Sergio Pitol and Elena Poniatowska, and artists and painters such as Manuel Felguerez, Vicente Rojo Almazán, José Luis Cuevas, Roger von Gunten, and Fernando García Ponce. He is credited for introducing authors such as Robert Musil, Thomas Mann, Jorge Luis Borges, Pierre Klossowski and Georges Bataille to the Mexican public.[2]

He received various prestigious prizes including the Premio Teatral Ciudad de México (1956), the Xavier Villaurrutia Award (1972) for his novel Encuentros, the Elías Sourasky Prize (1974), the Premio Anagrama de Ensayo (1981), the Premio de la Crítica (1985), the National Prize for Arts and Sciences in Linguistics and Literature (1989), the FIL Literary Award in Romance Languages (then known as the Juan Rulfo Prize for Latin American and Caribbean Literature) (2001) and the Medalla Eligio Ancona.[3][4][5]

In 2007 the journal Nexos asked various writers and literary critics to select the greatest Mexican novels of the past 30 years. Juan García Ponce's novel Crónica de la intervención came in third place.[6]

García Ponce died on 27 December 2003 in his house in Mexico City, aged 71. The cause was respiratory failure derived from multiple sclerosis.[7][8][9]

Awards

edit

References

edit
  1. ^ "La mirada en el constructo erótico de Juan García Ponce". Retruécano (in Spanish). 23 September 2020. Retrieved 14 July 2023.
  2. ^ "Juan García Ponce". La Ruptura (in Spanish). Retrieved 14 July 2023.
  3. ^ "Juan García Ponce - Premio Rulfo" (in Spanish). Archived from the original on 13 November 2011. Retrieved 1 June 2015.
  4. ^ "Premio Nacional de Ciencias y Artes" (PDF) (in Spanish). Consejo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes. Archived from the original (PDF) on 22 July 2011. Retrieved 14 July 2023.
  5. ^ "Juan García Ponce – Medalla "Eligio Ancona"" (in Spanish). Archived from the original on 26 June 2015. Retrieved 14 July 2023.
  6. ^ "Eligen las tres mejores novelas mexicanas de los últimos 30 años". El Universal (in Spanish). 29 March 2007. Archived from the original on 11 May 2015. Retrieved 14 July 2023.
  7. ^ Ceballos, Miguel Ángel (28 December 2003). "Muere el escritor Juan García Ponce". El Universal (in Spanish). Retrieved 14 July 2023.
  8. ^ "Muere García Ponce, uno de los grandes autores mexicanos del último medio siglo". ABC.es (in Spanish). 28 December 2003. Retrieved 14 July 2023.
  9. ^ "Falleció el escritor mexicano Juan García Ponce". Letralia (in Spanish). 5 January 2004. Retrieved 14 July 2023.

Bibliography

edit
  • Rodríguez-Hernández, Raúl: Mexico's Ruins: Juan García Ponce and the Writing of Modernity. State University of New York Press, 2007. ISBN 978-0-7914-6943-9