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The great Carlos Fuentes comes to town to talk about “Immigration: Challenges on Both Sides of the Border” — but expect a lot of other targets from a literary lion whose roar is undiminished. this event is a big one.

When: Monday, October 15 7:30 PM
Where: Butler University, Clowes Memorial Hall

Free and open to the public, but a ticket is required for admission. Tickets are available for the Fuentes lecture beginning at 10 a.m. Sept. 14

Carlos Fuentes is Mexico’s most celebrated novelist and critic. Fifteen of his novels have been published in the United States. He also writes for many European magazines, and his work has appeared in the The Nation, Vanity Fair, The New York Times and The Washington Post Book World. He is also a columnist for the daily newspaper Reforma in Mexico City.

Fuentes served as Mexico’s ambassador to France from 1975-77. A scholar of law and Latin American studies, he has held endowed professorships at Harvard University and the University of Cambridge, England. Most recently, Fuentes has taught at Princeton, Dartmouth, Washington, Cornell and Brown universities.

This kick-off for Butler University’s 20th annual Celebration of Diversity Distinguished Lecture Series is also a hallmark event of Butler’s Hispanic Heritage Celebration.

Know before you go … For a flavor of Fuentes’s thinking about his country and its relations with the giant to the North, see his recent piece on “A New Era for Mexico.” And read his novels! He does have a Hoosier connection: The book most familiar to Americans (because it was made into a film with Jane Fonda and Gregory Peck) is The Old Gringo … the main character is called “The Indiana General.” One of Fuentes’s most ambitious novels, The Death of Artemio Cruz, is as relevant today as it was more than a third of a century ago. Related to his Indianapolis talk on the challenges of immigration is his novel-told-through-nine-stories, The Crystal Frontier.

If this sounds interesting, you should check out … Some other discussions of Mexico and immigration to the US: Michael Snodgrass examines the effects of immigration on the Mexican state of Jalisco September 14; the ACLU debates “Immigrants Are Here. Now what? Challenges of Immigration in Indiana” December 5; and you can hear “Sharing the Journey: Immigrants’ Stories” November 13, and see the student-made video “Loz Invenzivlez: Our Invincible Youth” November 3. Some Hoosiers who hear Fuentes may have their feathers ruffled by a foreigner speaking harshly of the Bush Administration … just rmember that Fuentes has always been a good friend of the United States, and he will seem positively gushing with praise compared to US-born Naomi Wolf on “Defending America” October 25.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, August 16th, 2007 at 8:51 am and is filed under Events, Democracy, Foreign policy, Mexico, Crossing borders, Law & justice, Hoosier history, Europe, Journalism, Novelists & writers, Human and civil rights, War & peace, Globalization, Latinos. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.