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Review Essay: Juan Rulfo (1917-86)
Ascencio, Juan [Antonio]. Un extraño en la tierra: biografía no autorizada de Juan Rulfo. México: Debate, 2005. 411 pp. ISBN 968-5957-11-8
Campbell, Federico, ed. La ficción de la memoria: Juan Rulfo ante la crítica. México: Coordinación de Difusión Cultural, Direccióon de Literatura, Universidad Autónoma de México (UNAM)/Ediciones Era, 2003. 552 pp. ISBN 970-32-0664-6 (UNAM) ISBN 968-411-602-0 (Era)
Rulfo, Juan. Aire de las Colinas: Cartas a Clara. Ed. y prol. Alberto Vital. Barcelona; Madrid: Plaza & Janés Editores/Debate, 2000. 341 pp. ISBN 84-01-01377-1; ISBN 84-83-06275-5 (paper)
___. Letras e imágenes. Intro. Victor Jiménez. México: Editorial RM, 2002. 175 pp. ISBN 968-5208-05-0
___. Pedro Páramo. Photographs by Josephine Sacabo. Trans. Margaret Sayers Peden. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2002. 161 pp. ISBN 0-292-77121-5
___. Voz del autor. 5 ed. Presentación de Felipe Garrido. México: UNAM/FCE [Voz Viva de Mexico: Entre Voces], 1999. [Two CDs and a booklet containing 3 stories, half of another and ten minutes of Pedro Páramo read by Rulfo.]
___, et al. Juan Rulfo: México, fotógrafo. Barcelona; México: Lunwerg Editores/Consejo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes (CONACULTA), 2001. 221 pp. ISBN 84-7782-778-8
___. Juan Rulfo's Mexico. Trans. Margaret Sayers Peden. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 2002. 223 pp. ISBN 1-58834-097-X
Vital [Díaz], Alberto. Juan Rulfo. México: CONACULTA, 1998. 63 pp. ISBN 970-18-1499-1
___. Noticias sobre Juan Rulfo: 1784-2003. México: Editorial RM/Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2004. 212 pp. ISBN 968-5208-27-1 [RM] ISBN 968-16- 7083-3 [FCE]
Not only has the celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Pedro Páramo (1955) brought forth a frenzy of newspaper articles in Mexico, but most recently there have been some serious works published about Rulfo's life, his writings and his photographs. Juan Ascencio's recently released "unauthorized biography" follows on the heels of Alberto Vital's monumental study, Noticias sobre Juan Rulfo; and while it would be like comparing apples to oranges, each work has its purpose, and each book differs so markedly from the other. I feel the need of them both to give me a middle ground to understand Rulfo. Ascencio, who tells us that he is a life-long friend, brings out dirty laundry; but Vital edited Rulfo's love letters to Clara for publication! We probably need both aspects of his private...