Germán Dehesa

Biography:

Born in Tacubaya, Mexico City, on July 1, 1944; died on September 2, 2010. Journalist, essayist, literary critic, actor, playwright, cultural promoter, television scriptwriter. He attended junior high school at the Instituto Mexico (1951-1959) and senior high school at the Centro Universitario Mexico (CUM) (1960-1962, when in Mexico senior high school studies lasted two years, not three), both institutions of the Marist Brothers in Mexico City. He studied Hispanic Language and Literature at UNAM, where he was a professor of Literature since 1966. He was a visiting professor at the University of Texas, United States. Contributor to Arquitecto, Cambio, Cartapacios, El Ángel of the daily Reforma, El Financiero, El Norte, Espectacular, Este País, Mural (Guadalajara), Novedades and Turismundo, among others. Collaborator in Radio Red, Radio IMER, Núcleo Radio Mil, Radio Fórmula, among others. He hosted the television program "La almohada", on Channel 13 and in television he participated in the program "El Ángel de Noche" on Channel 40. Author and theater director of the plays Monjas coronadas (1989) and Cartas a Santa Fox, and only director of Hedda Gabler (1981). He was author of: Pastorela para tiempos de crisis and Después... actuaremos nosotros. Director of the shows La planta de Luz, Zedilleus and Cancionero del Sur, Cartas a Santa Fox and Adiós milenio cruel. Parliamentary Journalism Award 1998. Don Quixote Journalism Award 2008, Spain. The jury declared that in his work he made "a brilliant synthesis (...) between the Spanish language and Mexican popular speech, in an imaginative combination of words, which demonstrates the plasticity, richness and vitality of the language of Cervantes". In 2010 he was decorated as "Distinguished Citizen" of Mexico City. On August 25, 2010, he announced in his column "Gaceta del Ángel" that he was suffering from terminal cancer and that, according to his doctors, he would die at the end of 2010. With his proverbial sense of humor, he assured that he would continue writing in the newspaper until his faculties allowed him to do so, and that he did not lose hope of living a few more years. A few days later, on September 2, 2010, he died of the disease.