Friedrich Katz Dies; lost
Mexico adept historian persecuted for a decade the trail of life of North Centaur
Erika P. Bucio With
biography of Pancho Villa, Friedrich Katz managed to get the "historical core" to its legend, the more difficult task because the leader left no records.
For 10 years, the historian pursued his trail by libraries and archives to write Pancho Villa, a book that would forever attached his name to Centaur North.
Katz died in Philadelphia in the early hours of yesterday, aged 83, from cancer abatidodo confirmed the University of Chicago.
a child is enamored of the history of Mexico, his adopted country. Born in Vienna, Austria, in 1927, immigrated with his family to Germany after three years. His father, a historian and journalist, wrote satirical articles against Hitler, and Katz had to flee to France in 1933, where they remained five years.
then emigrated to America, and thence to Mexico as refugees during the regime of Lázaro Cárdenas (1934-1940).
"My passion for the history of Mexico has many roots, one is grateful that this country saved my life and another is because being a victim of history, it is natural to wonder why," he confessed.
A country to which he traveled frequently, where you feel at home and said he did not hesitate in awarding the Order of the Aztec Eagle.
Along with The Secret War in Mexico, Katz believed to Pancho Villa (Era, 1998) as his best book.
As a historian did not like the word hero: "It involves a vision in black and white. Obviously the characters are nuanced. It tried to show with Villa," said Katz.
"(Pancho Villa) is a very solid, fundamental for me: in fact, choose to write or not (my biography) Villa, depended reading Katz's book," said the writer Paco Ignacio Taibo II.
historian's death was also weighed at the Villa family. His granddaughter Rosa Helia Katz recalled as a meticulous researcher who did not miss the truth writing about the head of the Northern Division.
"When the book was published by Stanford University Press, Katz invited us to a conference at the University of Chicago. It was beautiful because for three days, spoke of Villa and historians were there ... it seemed the North Division, said from San Luis Potosi.
granddaughters Villa, Rosa Helia Guadalupe, hoped to see Katz on 4 November in Columbia University in New York, during the presentation of a book containing the papers given in tribute that was paid in 2007 .
"Let's turn the ceremony in a tribute to Friedrich where will your family" anticipated historian Eugenia Meyer, a friend of Katz.
meticulous researcher, declined to be read only by academics and prevailed in his work an effort to make understandable the past. This is portrayed in his disciple Javier Garciadiego Letras Libres when Katz turned 80.
works · The Secret War in Mexico: Europe, the United States, and the Mexican Revolution. The University of Chicago Press, 1981. English edition: The Secret War in Mexico, Ediciones Era, 1982.
· Tests Mexican. Alianza Editorial, 1994.
· Ancient American Civilizations, London, 1969, 1997.
· Pancho Villa, His Life and Times, Stanford University Press, 1998.
English edition: Pancho Villa, Ediciones Era, Mexico 1998.
As editor:
· Revolt, Rebellion and Revolution: the struggle in rural Mexico from the sixteenth to the twentieth century, Ediciones Era.
Taken REFORM
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