Five Authors in the Spotlight

Has your relationship to writing changed with age? How?

Isabel Allende: Now that I’m in my 60s, my style has changed: it is more direct, I use fewer adjectives, my sentences are shorter, and I go straight to the point. Times have changed, literature has changed too, and the fact that I live, work, and read in English has modified my style.

Jorge Ramos: Writing has become an essential part of my life as I approach 50 years of age. It is a way to organize my ideas, to contribute something to this society, and to get in touch with those around me. But more importantly, writing allows me to express my innermost thoughts and feelings in ways in which a simple conversation can’t.

Javier Sierra: My style and subjects of interest have changed with the time. At the beginning, my interests were more phenomenological, and now they are more spiritual. In a way, I feel that I am still growing.

Cristina García: I’m less satisfied with describing the surface and more interested in what’s less visible but more crucial. I’m more interested in the archeology of character and events rather than the events themselves. In other words, I’m interested in origins and inheritance and how history gets made.

Victor Villaseñor: I started writing on the 16th of September, 1960, at six in the morning. And today, 47 years later, I started writing at 4:30 in the morning. So I start earlier because I have so much to say! And my tools are smoother: instead of taking 16 years to write a book, it only takes a couple. But I just felt as excited today when I got up to write as I did 47 years ago.