Latine Authors to Celebrate This National Hispanic Heritage Month

National Hispanic Heritage Month is here! To celebrate, below are some latine authors that are sure to inspire. While only some deal with race explicitly in their writing, they all represent the diversity present amongst latine writers. Representing the rich tapestry of Hispanic literature in a brief list is impossible, so take the following names as just a taste of a tradition rich with so many more wonderful authors and artists.

Isabel Allende

Chilean-American writer Isabel Allende is one of the most successful and prolific latine authors of all time. With over 77 million books sold in a variety of languages, her books have reached readers all over the globe. Her first book, “The House of the Spirits,” has remained one of her most famous pieces and features many hallmarks of her writing, such as the usage of magical realism to tell generational stories. For the purposes of celebrating Hispanic Heritage month, it would be remiss not to mention that Allende won the Hispanic Heritage Foundation’s Award for Literature in 1996. Just last year, Allende published a new book, “The Wind Knows My Name,” which could be a great jumping off point for newcomers to her works.

Jorge Luis Borges

Jorge Luis Borges was an Argentine short story writer, essayist, and poet. His short stories sparkle with both his wonderful sense of humor and his experimental ideas. Stories like “Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius” showcase both of these strengths through the discovery of a fictional country that serves as a thought experiment about the nature of language. Furthermore, Borges’s poems are incredible meditations on the themes of recollection, mortality, and cultural diffusion. His rich imagery and distinctive voice make it no surprise that his works are considered a key pillar of Spanish-language literature.

Gabriel García Marquez

Also specializing in magical realism, Colombian author Gabriel García Marquez is most known for his seminal work, “One Hundred Years of Solitude.” The novel, a key piece of the Spanish-language literacy canon, follows generations of a Colombian family experiencing supernatural events in their hometown, the fictional Macondo, which was founded by their patriarch. His other novels and short stories, like the collection “Strange Pilgrims” or his book “Love in the Time of Cholera,” follow Latin American characters through enthralling and, at times, fantastical narratives. “Strange Pilgrims” in particular stands out as depicting various Latin American characters in Europe, reflecting Marquez’s focus on the interplay of history and identity in Latin America.

Carmen Maria Machado

Carmen Maria Machado writes more about her identity as it relates to queerness rather than race, but her work is undeniably interesting and relevant to the cross-section of LGBTQ+ and latine identities. In her collection of horror short stories, “Her Body and Other Parties,” for which she won the John Leonard Prize National Book Critics Circle Award, she created both gripping and off-putting narratives. Her incredible memoir, “In the Dream House,” documents Machado’s experience in an abusive relationship while simultaneously exploring different tropes of literature and film. Her works have a personal touch that imbue each piece with tenderness, even in the face of struggle.

Elizabeth Acevedo

Primarily a poet, Elizabeth Acevedo grew up in New York City as the child of Dominican immigrant parents. She has made a name for herself both with her poetry anthologies and with her novels. Her young adult novel “The Poet X,” which won the National Book Award for Young People’s Literature, explores the identity of an Afro-Latina growing up in New York City while dealing with the pressure of a religious mother and touches upon the upon the intersection of key themes such as sexuality, race, and religion. Additionally, Acevedo’s poems are evocative and minimal, using sparse lines filled with rich imagery. Each poem points to Acevedo’s precise control over language which makes for an engaging and meaningful read.

Valeria Luiselli

Aside from being a visiting professor at Harvard University, Mexican-American author Valeria Luiselli is one of the most exciting authors writing today. Throughout her work, she constantly plays with form, positioning herself in a tradition of modernist writers. Luiselli notably incorporates the work she’s done with Latin American migrants into her writing with books like “The Story of My Teeth” and “Lost Children Archive” that provide a platform for these under-represented voices. Her balance of timely political issues as well as genre-pushing technique make her works worth the read.

—Staff writer Ria S. Cuéllar-Koh can be reached at ria.cuellarkoh@thecrimson.com.