“Childhood is your native land, and language is your native land—the two elements for a writer, of course,” says Mexican author Sergio Pitol. In this program, the Cervantes Prize-winning writer reflects on his love of reading, which began at a very young age, and his lifelong admiration for the works of Jules Verne and Thomas Mann. In addition, the author of El Viaje, El Arte de la Fuga, El Desfile del Amor, and La Vida Conyugal shares his thoughts on changes in Mexico over the past several decades, the New French Novel of the 1950s and ’60s, and the publishing industry’s incessant demand for magical realism, which, to Pitol’s relief, has finally abated. (Spanish, 25 minutes)