Miguel Delibes, an acclaimed Spanish novelist whose work featured gritty depictions of rural life, died Friday. He was 89.
Delibes, who had been fighting cancer of the colon for several years, died at his home in the north central city of Valladolid shortly around 7 a.m., Spanish National Radio said.
He is known for novels such as Cinco Horas with Mario (Five Hours with Mario), published in 1966, and Las guerras de nuestros antepasados (The Wars of Our Ancestors), published in 1975, and El hereje (The Heretic), publiished in 1988.
"We must remember him as a good person and a great writer," Education Minister Angel Gabilondo said in a radio interview.
Delibes started off as a cartoonist for a provincial newspaper before becoming a reporter, editor and finally a novelist.
His 50-year career culminated with him winning the Spanish-speaking world's top literary award, the Cervantes Prize, in 1993. He was also a member of the Spanish Royal Academy, the official watchdog of the Spanish language.
"I feel sorry that there was not enough time for him to win the Nobel, because he was one of those authors who deserved it, said Culture Minister Angeles Gonzalez-Sinde.
"He was a much-read writer, incredibly prolific and also a great inspiration for other artists," she said.
Delibes came from Valladolid, a city in the Castilian heartland of central Spain, and his writing reflected his deep roots there and love of rural life.
One of his most popular books, Los Santos Inocentes (The Innocent Saints), published in 1981, illustrates the impoverished existence of peasants living under a selfish and wealthy landowner.
In a dramatic scene near the end, a simple-minded peasant rigs a trap that hangs the rich man after he shoots the peasant's pet bird with a hunting rifle. The book was made into a movie in 1984 by Spanish director Mario Camus.
In Five Hours with Mario, a widow sitting by her husband's coffin muses over their time together and critiques the beliefs and social mores of provincial life.
Delibe was somewhat of a hermit, shunning limelight and crowds.
"I like open spaces. I like nature, and I also like to converse with my colleagues, face to face, or with two of them, or three, but no more," Delibes said in an interview published in 1986.
In his acceptance speech when he won the Cervantes prize, Delibes looked back on his career and said life goes by quicker for writers because they spend so much time inside the heads of their characters, neglecting their own existence.
He noted that the protagonist of one his books once commented to an older co-worker, aged 70, that "if I were that age I would die of fright."
"Now I must admit I have that same age," Delibes said in the speech. "How is this possible?"
The Cervantes Institute said Delibes's passion for the countryside — and hunting — had given him a true feel for the decline of rural life and the fragility of the environment.
His wife died in 1974, plunging him into depression and she was a dominant figure of his novel Señora de rojo sobre fondo gris (Lady in Red on a Gray Background), published in 1991.
Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/arts/books/story/2010/03/12/miguel-delibes-obituary.html?ref=rss#ixzz0i0Zug7BN
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