Héctor Abad Faciolince in Conversation

The Department of Spanish & Portuguese is pleased to invite you to a candid conversation with renowned Colombian author Héctor Abad Faciolince.

Abad Faciolince (b. Medellin,1958) is considered one of the most talented and influential post-Latin American Boom writers. Author of 15 books, including bestselling novels Angosta (2004), La Oculta (2014), and most recently Salvo mi corazón, todo está bien (2022).

Mr. Abad’s 2005 beloved Oblivion: A Memoir (first published as El olvido que seremos) is a memorial, and an artist’s meditation on absence and memory. It tells the story of his father, Héctor Abad Gómez, a leading public health and human rights advocate taken in Medellín in 1987. This book, and his journalistic work, has placed him as one of the most prominent authors in the area of human rights. He has also authored the foreword to the book A Colombian Suitcase: The Colombian Experience of Exile and the Truth Commission (2021).

He is recipient of multiple awards, including Colombia National Short Story Prize 1980, Simón Bolívar National Prize (journalism) 1998; Primer Premio Casa de América de Narrativa Innovadora (for Basura) 200; DAAD Fellowship (Berlin 2006); Best Foreign Novel (China, 2004 for Angosta); Casa de America, Lisboa (2014); and WOLA-Duke University Human Rights Book Award (2012), among others.

His work has been translated into 15 different languages, and has been brought to screen in a feature film, Haunted Heart (2009), and a documentary, Letter to a Shadow (2015).

Note: The event will be held in Spanish. We are glad to offer simultaneous Spanish - English interpretation for a limited number of attendees.