Roberto Ampuero Espinoza

Roberto Ampuero (born 20 February 1953 in Valparaíso, Chile) is a Chilean author, columnist, and the former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Chile, a position he held from March 11, 2018 to June 13, 2019.

His first novel ¿Quién mató a Kristián Kustermann? was published in 1993 and in it he introduced his private eye, Cayetano Brulé, winning the Revista del Libro prize of El Mercurio. Since then the detective has appeared in five novels. In addition he has published an autobiographical novel about his years in Cuba titled Nuestros Años Verde Olivo (1999) and the novels Los Amantes de Estocolmo (Book of the Year in Chile, 2003 and the bestseller of the year in Chile )) and Pasiones Griegas (chosen as the Best Spanish Novel in China, 2006). His novels have been published in Latin America and Spain, and have been translated into German, French, Italian, Chinese, Swedish, Portuguese, Greek, Croatian, and English. In Chile his works have sold more than 40 editions.

Ampuero now resides in Iowa where he is a professor at the University of Iowa in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese. He was a columnist of La Tercera and the New York Times Syndicate and since March 2009 has been working as a columnist for El Mercurio. Between 2013 and 2014 he was Minister of Culture in the government of Sebastián Piñera.

Early life (1953–1973)

Roberto Ampuero Espinoza was born in Valparaiso in 1953, as the son of Roberto Ampuero Brule and Angelica Espinoza. He grew up in a "porteña middle class family who leaned to the political right," In his first years, he carried out his studies in the David Trumbull Presbyterian School, and later in the German school Deutsche Schule of Valparaiso (DSV) because his parents considered it to be an "excellent private school that was near the house" In addition, he thanks DSV for helping him to become closer to writers such as Goethe, Schiller, Brecht, and Mann, and remembers that the school "marked my decision to travel the world with my nomadic soul." After the coup d'état at the end of September in 1973, he decided to depart for East Germany.

Exile to Cuba (1973–1979)

Thanks to a contact in the Eastern German Embassy, he left Chile in 1973 after receiving a scholarship for journalism in the University of Karl Marx in Leipzig. In 2008 he remembered that: "When I arrived in Cuba in 1974 and I saw the economic disaster I thought that it was as much a democracy as I am a Martian, I said to myself 'this is not the country I want! I quit the JJCC (communist youth) in 1976 in La Habana where everything was going on'"

He enrolled in the Humboldt University where he took postgraduate courses in literature, economics, and politics until 1983. During these years he worked as a translator.

West Germany (1983–1993)

In 1983 he crossed over to West Germany. From that year until 1993 he worked as a correspondent for the Italian agency IPS and as director of the German magazine Desarrollo y Cooperación, in Bonn. The following year he published his first novel, called El Hombre Golondrina in German, and in 1985 he published his second novel, La Guerra de los Duraznos, also in German. One of the two novels is illustrated by Santos Chávez. Both novels were published later in Spanish in 1997 and 2001 respectively, corrected and further developed.

In 1987 he married Ana Lucrecia Rivera Schwarz, who was an ambassador of Guatemala in Germany.

Between 1994 and 1997 he worked in real estate. The following year he published Boleros en La Habana and won the Segundo Premio, Concurso de Cuentos de "Artes y Letras," El Mercurio and the Círculo de Críticos de Arte de Valparaíso. Two years later, in 1996 he published his third novel about the Cuban detective El Alemán de Atacama. That year he received the Reconocimiento Ilustre Municipalidad de Viña del Mar for his contributions to literature.

Sweden (1997–2000)

In 1997 he moved in with a Swedish family, residing in Stockholm. This same year he published El Hombre Golondrina, in Spanish and then in 1999 finished the book he had started writing in Cuba titled Nuestros Años Verdes Olivo. He says "the book was conceived to leave a testimony for my sons and grandsons, without thinking of publishing it, but I took the power of the "reality/fiction" that all novels have." The movie will be released at Roos Film and it will be directed by Ignacio Eyzaguirre with the script written by Luís Ponce.

Ampuero was also creator of the histories, characters, and scenes of Brigade Escorpión (Chilean National Television (TVN) 1997) the first political television series that was produced in Chile and one of the first in Latin America.

Iowa

In 2000 he moved to Iowa City with his wife and taught at the University of Iowa in the Spanish and Portuguese Department.

Mexico City

In 2011 he was appointed as the Chilean ambassador to Mexico under Sebastián Piñera.

Works 1993 ¿Quién mató a Cristián Kustermann? (novela policial), Editorial Planeta. "Who Killed Cristián Kusterman?" 1994 Boleros en La Habana (novela policial), Editorial Planeta. "Boleros in Havana" 1996 El alemán de Atacama (novela policial), Editorial Planeta. "The German of Atacama" 1997 El hombre golondrina (cuentos), Editorial Planeta. "The Swallow Man: and other stories" 1999 Nuestros años verde olivo, Editorial Planeta. "Our Olive Green Years" 2001 La guerra de los duraznos (novela juvenil), Editorial Andrés Bello. "The War of the Peaches" 2003 Los amantes de Estocolmo, Editorial Planeta. "The Stockholm Lovers" 2004 Cita en el Azul Profundo (novela policial), Editorial Planeta. "Appointment at the Azul Profundo" 2005 Halcones de la noche, Editorial Planeta. "Nighthawks" 2006 La Historia como conjetura. La narrativa de Jorge Edwards (ensayo), Editorial Andrés Bello. "The Story as Conjecture. The narrative of Jorge Edwards" 2006 Pasiones griegas, Editorial Planeta, 260 págs. "Greek Passions" 2008 El caso Neruda, Norma-La Otra Orilla, 330 pages, "The Neruda case". 2010 La otra mujer, La otra Orilla, 370 pages, "The other woman" 2013 Bahía de los misterios, Plaza Janés, 344 pages, Bay of mysteries. 2014 El Ultimo Tango de Salvador Allende, Vintage Espanol. "The Last Tango of Salvador Allende". English translation 2012 The Neruda Case, trans. Carolina De Robertis

Awards and honors

1977 Premio Lautaro de Cuentos. Comité de la Resistencia Chilena, La Habana 1978 Mención Concurso de Cuentos 13 de Marzo, Universidad de La Habana . 1993 ¿Quién mato a Cristian Kustermann?, selected by El Mercurio Book Review in 1993. 1994 Segundo Premio, Concurso de Cuentos de "Artes y Letras", El Mercurio. 1994 Círculo de Críticos de Arte de Valparaíso. 1996 Reconocimiento Ilustre Municipalidad de Viña del Mar, por sus aportes literarios. 2003 Los Amantes de Estocolmo, selected as “Book of the Year 2003” by Review of Books, Santiago, Chile. 2006 Designated an “Illustrious son” by the city of Valparaíso. 2006 Pasiones Griegas, selected Best Spanish-language novels published in 2006 by The People's Publishing House of China, Beijing. 2008 Premio Personalidades 2008, reconocimiento otorgado por la Corporación Cultural de la Quinta Región, el que forma parte de los Premios Regionales al Mérito Cultural