The United States condoned dictatorships in Latin America for much of the 20th century.

Some writers achieve great popularity and then disappear forever. The bestseller lists of the past fifty years are, with a few lively exceptions, a sombre graveyard of dead books.

Now the masses of Latin America are electing governments they feel can take forward the democratic reforms of the last 20 years, and transform them into social and economic reforms. This is, I think, extremely important, because it also means that the left has abandoned the revolutionary solution proposed by Che Guevara and has taken the democratic path.

I believe in books that do not go to a ready-made public. I'm looking for readers I would like to make. To win them, to create readers rather than to give something that readers are expecting. That would bore me to death.

Incredible the animal that first dreamed of another animal.

Reading, writing, teaching, learning, are all activities aimed at introducing civilizations to each other.

I need, therefore I imagine.