Juan Nepomuceno Carlos Pérez Rulfo Vizcaíno, known professionally as Juan Rulfo, was born on May 16, 1917, in the town of Sayula, Jalisco, located in the western part of central Mexico. Jalisco is a Nahuatl word that means “sandy plain” and this is precisely the hot, arid, imposing terrain where nearly all of Rulfo’s narratives are set. Rulfo spent a great deal of his childhood in the house of his paternal grandparents in San Gabriel. During this time, he was granted access to the library of a priest who stored his books in his grandparents’ home. These texts were fundamental to his literary development.
Though a strike at the University of Guadalajara prevented him from enrolling, Rulfo...
