Pedro Ángel Palou

Pedro Ángel Palou (born in Puebla, Mexico, 1966) is a prolific novelist and essayist. He has worked in the public service as Minister of Culture and in Higher Education, for fifteen years as Professor of Literature and President of Universidad de las Américas in Puebla (UDLA), the second largest private university in Mexico. He has also been Visiting Professor in Paris (Sorbonne Rene Descartes), with Michel Maffesoli, and in Dartmouth College where he was writer in residence (2011-2012). Professor Palou has a Ph.D in Social Sciences and was honored with the Francisco Xavier Clavigero National Prize in History for his book about sociology of culture in Mexico between 1900-1940, La casa del silencio, aproximación en tres tiempos a Contemporáneos. In 2009, he was a finalist of the Planeta Casa America competition with his novel El dinero del diablo, published in twenty-two countries of the Spanish-speaking world. His latest books are El fracaso del mestizo, (Mestizo Failure(s), Cinema, Identity and Literature in XXth Century Mexico) and the novel No me dejen morir así, about Pancho Villa's revolution. He is the author of fifty nine books, including an acclaimed novel, Como quien se desangra (Xavier Villaurrutia Prize in 2003) and an historical trilogy, about Zapata, Morelos and Cuauhtémoc, three important heroes of Mexican history.

He holds two Doctorates Honoris Causa from UNESCO and also the Ricardo Palma University in Peru and received a Guggenheim Fellowship for fiction writing.  He is an anchorman on public television (History Channel and Canal 22), Currently his is the Fletcher Professor of Oratory and Chair of Romance Languages at Tufts University

BOOKS