SOURCE: Stavans, Ilan. “Jorge Ibargüengoitia.” Antiheroes, translated by Jesse H. Lytle and Jennifer A. Mattson, pp. 131-38. Cranbury, N.J.: Associated University Presses, 1997.

In the following essay, Stavans explores Ibargüengoitia's detective novels.

Born in Guanajuato in 1928, Jorge Ibargüengoitia, whose family moved to the Distrito Federal when he was thirteen, studied engineering at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, but abandoned this notion and returned home to work on a ranch. After three years in the province, he decided to dedicate himself to the theater after one of Los Contemporáneos, Salvador Novo, director of the Teatro Juárez, presented Rosalba y los llaveros, a play by Emilio Carballido. Novo invited Ibargüengoitia to one of the performances, and the episode enchanted the young man. “I don't know if the performance was excellent or if my anemic condition was extraordinarily receptive,” Ibargüengoitia later...