The Labyrinth of Solitude

Octavio Paz, celebrated poet, diplomat and essayist, was born in 1914 in Mexico City. He began to write at an early age and went on to become a critic and translator, teaching at Cambridge and Harvard Universities. He also served as a diplomat and was Mexican ambassador to France and India. Alongside Pablo Neruda and Jorge Luis Borges, Paz's work has influenced the politics and culture both of his own country and of the world. He received the Miguel de Cervantes Prize in 1981, and the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1990. He died in 1998.