José Agustín facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
José Agustín
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José Agustín in 2013
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| Born | José Agustín Ramírez Gómez 19 August 1944 Acapulco, Guerrero, Mexico |
| Died | 16 January 2024 (aged 79) Cuautla, Morelos, Mexico |
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| Nationality | Mexican |
| Period | 1964–2024 |
| Literary movement | La Onda |
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José Agustín Ramírez Gómez (19 August 1944 – 16 January 2024) was a Mexican novelist, short story writer, essayist and screenwriter. He is considered one of the most influential and prolific Mexican writers of the second half of the 20th century.
Contents
Career
José Agustín was born in Acapulco, Guerrero, on 19 August 1944. He studied Classical Literature at the School of Philosophy and Letters of the National Autonomous University of Mexico, Film direction at the Centro Universitario de Estudios Cinematográficos and Dramaturgy at the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura.
Agustín participated in Juan José Arreola's writers' workshop from 1962 to 1965, where he wrote his first novel, La Tumba (The Tomb), when he was nineteen years old. The novel, being the brief story of a Mexican upper-class teen, gathered praise from older writers. This and his most famous work, De Perfil (Profile View), a fast and detailed view of three days in the main character's life, show stylistic similarities to James Joyce's work, especially A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.
He was considered a member of the so-called Onda literature, onda (wave) being slang for current and fashionable views in the eyes of young people.
A common technique in his work is mixing a character's speech with narrative, without making any kind of distinction (free indirect discourse). Thus the reader finds a long dialogue written in a single sentence, and is expected to realize which character is speaking as he reads the words. He also made use of the stream of consciousness technique.
Agustín taught at the University of Denver, the University of California, Irvine, and the University of New Mexico.
Awards
- 1977: Guggenheim Fellowship
- 1993: Premio Nacional de Literatura Juan Ruiz de Alarcón
- 2011: Premio Nacional de Ciencias y Artes
Filmography
- 5 de chocolate y 1 de fresa (1968)
- Luz externa (1974)
- El año de la peste (1979)
See also
In Spanish: José Agustín para niños
- List of people from Morelos, Mexico
