Director Enrique Krauze Frequency Monthly Country Mexico and Spain | Categories Literature Publisher Editorial Vuelta | |
First issue 1999; 18 years ago (1999) | ||
Letras Libres is a Spanish-language monthly literary magazine published in Mexico and Spain.
History and profile
Letras Libres, printed since 1999 in Mexico and since 2001 in Spain, has an average of eighteen to twenty articles in every issue. Mexican historian Enrique Krauze is the founder of the magazine and he is also editor. The publisher is Editorial Vuelta, a prominent publishing company co-founded by the Nobel Prize laureate in Literature, Octavio Paz. The headquarters of the magazine is in Mexico City.
The magazine is the heir to previous Latin American literary magazines, specifically Vuelta, which ceased publication in 1998 with the death of its founder Paz.
At beginning of the 2000s, the magazine launched its website, which was designed by Danilo Black.
According to statistics publicized by the magazine on its tenth anniversary, 40% of its pieces during its first decade have been written by Mexican authors, 25% by non-Mexican Spanish-speakers, and 25% by non Spanish-speakers. The latter works were translated specifically for the magazine.
Some of the regular contributors of the magazine are leading intellectuals of Latin America and other countries: Mario Vargas Llosa, Gabriel Zaid, Rodrigo Fresán, Guillermo Sheridan, Fernando Savater, Hugo Hiriart, Juan Villoro, Alberto Barrera Tyszka, José de la Colina, José Emilio Pacheco, Enrique Vila-Matas, Adolfo Castanon, Roger Bartra, David Rieff, Bisam Álvaro, Jorge Edwards and Patricio Pron.
Standish and Bell classify Letras Libres as "right wing" in its political views, although it has published left-wing writers as well. They say that, as it represents the cultural and literary establishments in Mexico, it can be classified as right wing.