Literatura

"I NEVER knew anyone so keenly alive to a joke as the king was. He seemed to live only for joking. To tell a good story of the joke kind, and to tell it well, was the surest road to his favor. Thus it happened that his seven ministers were all noted for their accomplishments as jokers. They all took after the king, too, in being large, corpulent, oily men, as well as inimitable jokers. Whether people grow fat by joking, or whether there is something in fat itself which predisposes to a joke, I have never been quite able to determine; but certain it is that a lean joker is a rara avis in terris..."

What’s happening?

Next week, cartoonist Lalo Alcaraz, lately of Los Angeles, is coming to AL DÍA to discuss his work. Lalo is best known for “La Cucaracha,” the United States’ first nationally syndicated comic strip which tackles politics from a Latino perspective. Off the page, he satirizes the news on his weekly radio show “The Pocho Hour of Power” and its associated website, pocho.com.

Under Martin Baron leadership, the Post has tackled with great success the odds of the digital era, surpassing in unique views the once unbeatable New York Times

For over 20 years, AL DIA has empowered the young to write their own story. Our Foundation is about to launch a project to bring the experiment to the next level.

The "billenials" are, by definition, hybrid creatures that share more than one culture and speak more than one language. This is becoming more commonplace in Philadelphia among the newest, youngest residents of the city.

I came across this book again this week, after I first picked it up several years ago in a Barnes & Noble Store in Philadelphia.

It is a book the former CEO of Chrysler Corporation, Lee Iacocca, wrote, after his magical and also controversial turnaround of the car manufacturer company, one of the "Big Three" in America.

Well, there were already 2 in my family. 

My brother Agustín, Electrical Engineer, and my brother Raúl, who just retired from his noble profession, after a long and meritorious career as a Mechanical Engineer.

At age 16, I wanted to be, if not "somebody", at least somebody else.

Make my life count for something —not like in an act of heroism— but, in a more earthly purpose, to avoid being a blatant redundancy.

Or perhaps, God forbids, a plain-vanilla, mediocre, self-conceited brat.

I dreamt for a long time about the idea of meeting this young lady in person, perhaps some time into the far future.

This ‘‘Colombiana,” in the good, not bad sense of the word, is influencing more the U.S. mainstream culture than Julián Castro ever would do, even if he gets the shot of being the running mate of Presidential Candidate Hillary Clinton.

As presidential nominee Donald Trump continues to berate a California judge for his Mexican parentage and alleged conflict of interest in presiding over a case against Trump University, a more nuanced conversation is taking place in small cities throughout the United States.

I recently walked by the house Gabriel García Márquez owned and used to stay at in Cartagena, Colombia, and I couldn’t wait to get to the keyboard to tell a personal story about this maestro of good literature and even better journalism.