Fernando del Paso
2007 LITERATURE FIL AWARD

I was born; I couldn't help it. I came into the world at my grandparents' house at 150 Orizaba Street in Mexico City. The house is still there, but it is old and falling down. I am old too, but I am not falling down yet. The first thing in life I ever liked, besides living, was drawing. Every letter is like a little picture, and I enjoyed learning to draw them, then joining them to make words, and joining words to make stories and poems. The first book I ever read was A Thousand and One Nights . After that, I read a thousand and one books. Well, maybe not that many, but a lot.

My name is Fernando like my father, and my last name is Del Paso. My mother's name was Irene. I went to school and dreamed of becoming a doctor but what I really wanted was to be a writer. So I wrote a number of novels, and two books of poetry for children; De la A a la Z por un poeta (A to Z by a Poet) and Paleta de Diez Colores (Palette of Ten Colours).

I hope that when the children who read these books are grown up, they will remember what it was like to be a child.

My wife's name is Socorro, and we have four children; Fernando, Alejandro, Adriana and Paulina; and five grandchildren. I am 67 years old, I was born on April 1, 1935 and I have pure white hair, but I envy people whose heart is even more pure. I don't believe in astrology, but I like my sign, Aries, very much. My problem is that when I write I feel like drawing, and when I draw I feel like writing. So I do both, at least I do them as well as I can. Fortunately I am ambidextrous; I can write with my right hand and draw with my left hand. That way, when one hand gets tired, I can put the other one to work.

Fernando del Paso is the author of Encuentra en cada cara lo que tiene de rara, Maricastaña y el ángel y ¡Hay naranjas y hay limones!