Quote by Juan Rulfo: “The dead weigh more than the living.”

The past and the people we have lost do not become lighter with time — they accumulate and press down on the living. Memory, grief, and obligation to the dead can be heavier burdens than any living responsibility. This is about how the past dominates the present.

Rulfo published Pedro Páramo in 1955, a novel narrated by the dead in a town of ghosts. Mexico was experiencing rapid urbanization and economic growth under the PRI, yet the rural communities Rulfo depicted remained impoverished and haunted by the violence of the Revolution and the Cristero War.

Mexican novelist and short story writer, author of the slim but monumental works Pedro Páramo and El Llano en llamas, which transformed Latin American fiction with their experimental narrative structure, ghostly atmosphere, and depiction of rural Mexican suffering. He is considered one of the most influential writers of the twentieth century despite his tiny output.