Carlos Fuentes, Mexican novelist, dies aged 83

Carlos Fuentes, the Mexican author who became one of the best-known novelists in the Spanish-speaking world, has died at the age of 83.

President Felipe Calderon announced the news on his Twitter account, saying, “I profoundly regret the death of our dear and admired Carlos Fuentes, writer and universal Mexican. May he rest in peace,” the Agence France Presse reports.

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Fuentes, who died Tuesday in a Mexico City hospital, was known for works including The Death of Artemio Cruz and The Old Gringo, according to Reuters.

His generation of writers, which includes Colombia’s Gabriel Garcia Marquez, drew international readership and attention to Latin American culture during a period when most of the region’s countries were under the control of strongmen, the Associated Press reports.

Fuentes won the Cervantes Prize, the Spanish-speaking world’s highest literary honor, in 1987.

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