SOURCE: "Nobel Laureate Octavio Paz Dies at 84," in Los Angeles Times, April 20, 1998, p. A18.

[In the following obituary, the commentator reviews the highlights of Paz's life and career.]

Octavio Paz, one of Mexico's greatest poets and writers and a Nobel prize winner, died Sunday, the official news agency Notimex said early today. He was 84. Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo announced Paz's death early today as Zedillo was returning from the Summit of the Americas in Chile, Mexican news media reported. The president did not give a cause of death or say when the author died.

A prolific writer whose literary career began at 17, Paz's distinctive surrealistic verse had broad appeal and was well-received by critics internationally. He won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1990.

Like most Mexican writers, Paz was preoccupied with his country's many paradoxes and contradictions, the contrasts between its ancient Indian past and a more recent...