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Plural Editorial Files
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Held at: Princeton University Library: Manuscripts Division [Contact Us]
This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held at the Princeton University Library: Manuscripts Division. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in their reading room, and not digitally available through the web.
Overview and metadata sections
Plural was founded by Mexican poet and Nobel Prize Laureate Octavio Paz (1914-1998) in Mexico City in 1971. Prior to Plural, Paz was living abroad intermittently as a diplomat since 1945. He was living in India as the Mexican ambassador in 1968, when he resigned in protest against the Mexican government's violent supression of student demonstrations in Tlatelolco during the Olympic Games. Upon returning to Mexico, Julio Scherer García, editor of the newspaper Excélsior, offered Paz the opportunity to start a new monthly journal. Despite it being housed and financed by Excélsior, Plural was to be an independent monthly publication, allowing Paz the freedom to select content and assemble a separate staff.
Plural was not strictly a literary journal. Beginning a new journal after resigning in protest against the actions of the Mexican government in Tlatelolco allowed Paz the platform to critically discuss Mexico's state of government and democracy. It also allowed Paz to open up Mexico to international intellectual cultural exchange. From its beginning, Plural strove to be a convergence for Latin American and other international intellectuals to write about trends in art, culture, and politics. For its first issues in late 1971, Paz reached out to a wide international list of contributors that included Guillermo Cabrera Infante, Claude Lévi Strauss, Susan Sontag, John Cage, Noam Chomsky, Severo Sarduy, Paul Goodman, Harold Rosenberg, Roman Jakobson, Henri Michaux, Dore Ashton, and Charles Tomlinson. Plural was imagined to be a Latin American journal that covered a wide range of disciplines including essay, criticism, and translation. This, juxtaposed with its historical location in post-1968 Mexican society, made Plural one of the most innovative and culturally significant monthly publications of its time. Its interdisciplinary nature and broad scope put the publication ahead of its time.
As Paz fulfilled various academic responsibilities abroad as visiting professor at various institutions like Cambridge and Harvard, he relied on an initial staff of Tomás Segovia and Sonia Levy-Spira to run the editorial office while he managed editorial capacities through telephone and written correspondence. Later, Plural's editorial staff consisted of Kazuya Sakai, an Argentine-Japanese painter and critic, who replaced Segovia as managing editor; Uruguayan writer Danubio Torres Fierro, and Mexican writer and translator José de la Colina. Other editors and staff included Gabriel Zaid, Alejandro Rossi, Salvador Elizondo, and Eusebio Rojas Guzmán.
Plural remained in publication until 1976 when the Excélsior workers' cooperative was dismantled in a golpe gubernamental, resulting in the government complicity in defaming and firing Julio Scherer García and his staff. Paz and other members of the Plural advisory committee printed their reaction and resignation from Excélsior's ties in Siempre!. Issue 58, published in July 1976, was the last Plural issue published under Paz's directorship. Both Excélsior and Plural continued as publications without the editorialship of Scherer García and Paz. Scherer García went on to begin a weekly magazine called Proceso and Paz began Vuelta. For more on Vuelta, which Paz edited until his death in 1998, see Vuelta Editorial Files (C1480).
The files comprise almost entirely of correspondence to various Plural editors and personnel Octavio Paz, Kazuya Sakai, Danubio Torres Fierro, José de la Colina, Sonia Levy-Spira, Julio Scherer García, Tomás Segovia, Eusebio Rojas Guzmán, and others. Correspondence features notable Mexican national and international contributors to Plural such as Octavio Armand, Julio Cortázar, Dore Ashton, Fernando Charry Lara, Guillermo Cabrera Infante, Carlos Fuentes, Roman Jakobson, Günter Grass, Pere Gimferrer, Mario Vargas Llosa, Charles Tomlinson, Severo Sarduy, Guillermo Sucre, José Olivio Jiménez, among others. In addition, there are few typescript manuscripts in Series 6.
Organized into the following series: Series 1: Octavio Paz; Series 2: Kazuya Sakai; Series 3: Danubio Torres Fierro; Series 4: Other Editors; Series 5: Consecutivo; Series 6: Non Correspondence
Biographical information taken from: King, John. The Role of Mexico's Plural in Latin American Literary and Political Culture. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007. Paz, Marie-José, Adolfo Castañón, Danubio Torres Fierro. A treinta años de Plural (1971-1976): revista fundada por Octavio Paz . Mexico: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2001.
Purchase, 2014 (AM 2015-13).
For preservation reasons, original analog and digital media may not be read or played back in the reading room. Users may visually inspect physical media but may not remove it from its enclosure. All analog audiovisual media must be digitized to preservation-quality standards prior to use. Audiovisual digitization requests are processed by an approved third-party vendor. Please note, the transfer time required can be as little as several weeks to as long as several months and there may be financial costs associated with the process. Requests should be directed through the Ask Us Form.
This collection was processed by Elvia Arroyo-Ramirez with assistance from Noga Zaborowski and Kristine Gift in July 2015. Finding aid written by Elvia Arroyo-Ramirez in July 2015.
Nothing was removed from the collection during the 2015 processing.
People
- Ashton, Dore
- Cabrera Infante, G. (Guillermo), 1929-2005
- Cage, John
- Charry Lara, Fernando
- Chomsky, Noam
- Cortázar, Julio
- Fuentes, Carlos
- Gimferrer, Pere, 1945-
- Grass, Günter, 1927-2015.
- Jakobson, Roman, 1896-1982.
- Jiménez, José Olivio
- Lévi-Strauss, Claude.
- Paz, Octavio, 1914-1998
- Pitol, Sergio, 1933-2018.
- Rama, Ángel
- Rodríguez Monegal, Emír
- Sakai, Kazuya, 1927-2001
- Sarduy, Severo
- Scherer García, Julio
- Segovia, Tomás, 1927-2011
- Sontag, Susan, 1933-2004.
- Sucre, Guillermo, 1933-
- Tomlinson, Charles, 1927-2015
- Torres Fierro, Danubio, 1947-
- Traba, Marta, 1930-1983
- Vargas Llosa, Mario (1936)
Subject
- Publisher
- Manuscripts Division
- Finding Aid Author
- Elvia Arroyo-Ramirez
- Finding Aid Date
- 2015
- Access Restrictions
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This collection is open.
- Use Restrictions
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Single photocopies may be made for research purposes. No further photoduplication of copies of material in the collection can be made when Princeton University Library does not own the original. Inquiries regarding publishing material from the collection should be directed to RBSC Public Services staff through the Ask Us! form. The library has no information on the status of literary rights in the collection and researchers are responsible for determining any questions of copyright.
Collection Inventory
Alphabetically, by last name and letter file (A-Z), with contents sorted chronologically starting with undated materials, then earliest to latest date.
Correspondence written by and sent to Octavio Paz; includes correspondence from individuals, organizations, and editorial publishers. Among this series is some of the first correspondence Paz wrote as Plural's editor, asking for and receiving contributions Plural's earliest issues. Notably, Paz reached out to a more international list of contributors such as Claude Lévi Strauss, Guillermo Cabrera Infante, Susan Sontag, John Cage, Noam Chomsky, Severo Sarduy, Paul Goodman, Harold Rosenberg, Roman Jakobson, Henri Michaux, Dore Ashton, and Charles Tomlinson. Note: Individuals who have more than three pieces of correspondence present in the collection are given their own file and are filed alphabetically. Individuals with two or less pieces of correspondence present in the collection are filed in letter files (A-Z files), and are sorted alphabetically within each letter file. There are few exceptions, based on notable individuals.
Physical Description3 boxes
Includes correspondence to or from The Academy of American Poets, Luis Aguilera Ponce, Else Albrecht-Carrie, Fernando Alegría, Oscar Alerhand, Jacques Ancet, Asociación Norteamericana de Maestros de Español y Portugués, and Francisco Ayala.
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Includes correspondence to or from Krishna Baldev Vaid, Basic Books Publishers, Calvin Bedient, Alberto Belloni, Mary Berg, Poldy Bird, Elizabeth Bishop, Max Black, César Blancarte, François Bourricaud, Joseph Brodski, Denise Browne Hare, Bureau des Copyrights Français, Michel Butor, and Ray Byram.
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Includes correspondence to or from David Calderón Mar, Antonio Candido, Jaime Cantarovici, Manuel Capetillo, Félix Cárdenas, Luis Cardoza y Aragón, Donald Carne-Ross, Arturo Carrera, Carlo Antonio Castro, César Carranza, Leonidas Cevallos, Colegio Nacional de Economistas A.C., Joel Colton (The Rockefeller Foundation), Ciaran Cosgrove, Edgardo Cozarinsky, Ana María Cué, Anthony Cursen, José Luis Cuevas, and Fernando Curiel.
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Includes correspondence to or from André Dalmov, Angel Damis, Clara Diament de Sujo, M.I. Díaz-Infante, Joaquín Diez Canedo, Michael Doudoroff, Georges Dumézil, and Robert Dyer.
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Includes correspondence to or from Salvador Elizondo, Marisol Escobar, and Etiémble.
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Includes correspondence to or from Betty Ann Farmer, Juan Ferraté, Monique Fong, Pamela Forcey, Jean Michel Fossey, and Celso Furtado.
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Includes correspondence to or from Edgar Gabaldon Márquez, John Kenneth Galbraith, Galleería M'Arte, Yossi Gamzu, Nadine Gardiner, Santiago Genovés, Eduardo González, Roberto González Echeverría, Ricardo González Franco, Jacqueline González Quintanilla, Efraín González Ramírez, Edmundo González Ríos, Paul Goodman, William Goodman, R. Gordon Wasson, Juan Goytisolo, John Gross, Mira Grujiedic, Roger Guedalla, Enrique G. Guerrero, Jorge Gurría Lacroix, and Somlyó György.
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Includes correspondence to or from Daniel H. H. Ingalls, Daniel Halpern, Samuel Hazo, Rodolfo Hinostroza, Rosario Hiriart, Hughes Gallerie Point Cardinal, and Eva Hunt.
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Includes correspondence to or from David Iván, Peter Jay, Betty Ann Karmer, Ugné Karvelis, Donald Keene, Pierre Klossowski, Leszer Kolakowski, and Max Kozloff.
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Includes correspondence to or from Alberto Lacerda, Martha Lamberg-Karlovsky, Latin American Studies Association, Juan Lechner, Monique Lemaitre, J. Kenneth Leslie, Suzanne Jill Levine, Francis Levy, Jean-Claude Libert, Raimundo Lida, Juan Liscano, Vicki Little, Adriana Lombardo, David Lorenzen, Artur Lundkvist, and Augusto Lunel.
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Includes correspondence to or from Luigi Majno, Ricardo Maliandi, Mandrake Bookstore, Ángel María de Lara, Juan Marichal, José G. Martínez Fernández, Gerardo Medina Váldes, Manuel Mejía Valera, Juan Vicente Melo, Ricardo Méndez Silva, Guy Merveille, Henri Michaux, Enrique Montero, Armando Morales Foncesa, Fredrick Morgan, Ottavio Mulas, Romul Munteanu, and Norman O'Brown.
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Includes correspondence to or from Margaret S. Peden, César Pérez de Francisco, Rafael Pérez Lobo, Enrique Pezzoni, André Pieyre de Mandiargues Francis Ponge, Jaime Preutf, and Dario Puccini.
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Includes correspondence to or from Sergio Ramírez, Carlos Ríncon, Mario Rivero, Jacques Robaud, Juan Carlos Rodríguez, Gonzalo Rojas, Affonso Romano de Sant Anna, Alex Rosenberg, Harold Rosenberg, Baron de Philippe Rothschild, Joaquín Roy, S.K. Roy, and Paul Russell Gebbett.
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Includes correspondence to or from Ernesto Sábato, Graham Sadler, Raúl Salazar Pozos, Jaime Salinas, David Samano, Manuel Sánchez, Nestor Sánchez, Arlyn Sánchez-Carbó de Silva, Pablo Santillán Ledesma, Max Da Costa Santos, Leo Sauvage, Julio César Schara, Manuel Scorza, Claude Seeport, Jorge Semprum, Rodrigo Sepúlveda, Noriaki Shiroo, Elizabeth Shub, John Silber, Ruth L.G. Simms, Albert Skira, Pierre Soulage, George Steiner, William Sulkin, Michael Sutton, and J. Swaminathan.
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Includes correspondence to or from Jivan Tabibian, Bill Terguso, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, J. Uriz, Diego Valdés, José Valdés, Edward Vasta, Tino Villanueva, Donald Walsh, Steve Weinberg, John Womack, Andrew Wright, Ricardo Yáñez, Howard T. Young, Adja Yunkers, José J.M. Zapata, Alex J. Zisman, and Salvador Zorrilla A.
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Alphabetically, by last name and letter file (A-Z), with contents sorted chronologically starting with undated materials, then earliest to latest date.
Includes correspondence written by and sent to Kazuya Sakai. Sakai's role in Plural was two-fold: he acted as Jefe de Redacción (Editor in Chief) and Artistic Director, in charge of the aesthetic look of the magazine. Sakai's correspondence reflects a stronger concentration in the arts with correspondence to visual artists, critics, gallerists, and dealers such as Dore Ashton, Jacqueline Barnitz, Fermín Fèvre, Marta Traba, Damián Bayón, and Carmen Waugh. Note: Individuals who have more than three pieces of correspondence present in the collection are given their own file and are filed alphabetically. Individuals with two or less pieces of correspondence present in the collection are filed in letter files (A-Z files), and are sorted alphabetically within each letter file. There are few exceptions, based on notable individuals.
Physical Description3 boxes
Includes correspondence to or from Juan Acha, Jean Adhémar, Luis F. Aguilar Villanueva, Elsa Arana, Nelson Blanco, Donald Bleznick, and Marcelo Boneverdi.
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Includes correspondence to or from Roger Caillois, Manuel Capetillo, Germano Celant, Jürgen Claus, Niegles Coles, and Norah Comstock.
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Includes correspondence to or from Paul Damaz, Lilia Dapaz de Strout, Jean Paul Delmas, Eduardo Deschamps, Daniel Alberto Dessein, Nelson Di Maggio, and Luis Alfonso Díez.
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Includes correspondence to or from Ediciones de Cultura Popular S.A., Arne Ekstrom, Marisol Escobar, Coriolano Fernández, Javier Fernández, Lawrence Franklin, and Eileen Friedenreich.
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Includes correspondence to or from Sara Gallardo, Julián Gállego, Jesús García Valera, Jorge Glusberg, Mathías Goeritz, Guggenheim Museum, Raúl Henao, Viola Herms Drath, Rolando Hinojosa, Elaine Horwitch, and Irving Howe.
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Includes correspondence to or from the Japan Center for International Exchange (JCIE), Roberto Juarroz, Leszek Kolakowski, Alan Laming, Marianna Lawrence, Monique Lemaitre, Lucy Lippard, and Elwyn Lynn.
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Includes correspondence to or from Susan Manso, Gustavo Massa, Jan van der Marck, Luis M. Mazzola, Sarah Mc Fadden, Margaret Mead, Ian Middleton, Antonio Millán Orozco (about Salomón de la Selva), Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores y Culto, Armida Muñoz de Salas, Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Álvaro Mutis, The New York Times, and The New York Review of Books.
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Includes correspondence to or from José Emilio Pacheco, Jean Perrault, Gaëtan Picon, Jerzy Plesnar, and Giovanni Quessep. Includes correspondence to or from
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Includes correspondence to or from E.L. Revol, Julián Ríos, Francisco Rivera, Jorge Rodríguez Padrón, Jean Rosenthal, Jorge Rufinell, and Brian Rushton.
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Includes correspondence to or from Horacio Salas, Rosario Santos, Michael Schmidt, Antonio Seguí, Cristobal Serra, and Gertrude Stein (Estate of).
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Includes correspondence to or from Edward Thompson, Michael Tizach, Tomaso Trini, Mario Usabiaga, University of Calgary, Joan-Pere Viladecans, Lee Williams, and A.J. Zisman.
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Alphabetically, by last name and letter file (A-Z), with contents sorted chronologically starting with undated materials, then earliest to latest date.
Includes correspondence written by and sent to Danubio Torres Fierro, who was part of Plural's editorial team from 1974-1976. Note: Individuals who have more than three pieces of correspondence present in the collection are given their own file and are filed alphabetically. Individuals with two or less pieces of correspondence present in the collection are filed in letter files (A-Z files), and are sorted alphabetically within each letter file. There are few exceptions, based on notable individuals.
Physical Description1 box
Includes correspondence to or from Homero Alsina Thevenet, José Balza, Damián Bayón, Carlos Germán Belli, José Bianco, Augusto de Campos, Eduardo Carranza, Adolfo Bioy Casares, Fernando Charry Lara, Ángel Crespo, Editions du Seuil, and Editorial Taurus.
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Includes correspondence to or from Vicente Gerbasi, Jaime Gil de Biedma, Juan Gil-Albert, Stephen Gilman, Víctor Gómez Pin, Juan Goytisolo, Roman Jakobson, Juan Lechner, and Georges Liébert.
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Includes correspondence to or from Carlos Martínez Rivas, Louis Mercier Vega, Jean Meyer, Héctor Olea, Jorge Rodríguez Padrón, Juan Sánchez Peláez, Richard Seaver, John Skirius, and Mario J. Valdés.
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Alphabetically, by last name and letter file (A-Z), with contents sorted chronologically starting with undated materials, then earliest to latest date.
Includes correspondence written by and sent to other Plural editors José de la Colina, Sonia Levy-Spira, Julio Scherer García, Tomás Segovia, and Eusebio Rojas Guzmán.
Physical Description1 box
Alphabetically, by last name and letter file (A-Z), with contents sorted chronologically starting with undated materials, then earliest to latest date.
Includes correspondence to or from José de la Colina, who was part of Plural's editorial team from 1973-1976.
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Alphabetically, by last name and letter file (A-Z), with contents sorted chronologically starting with undated materials, then earliest to latest date.
Includes correspondence to and from Sonia Levy-Spira, Plural's administrator from its beginning to end.
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Alphabetically, by last name and letter file (A-Z), with contents sorted chronologically starting with undated materials, then earliest to latest date.
Correspondence addressed to Julio Scherer García as "Director General" of Plural. Scherer García was involved in the creation of Plural, but he never occupied an official post in Plural's editorial team. He maintained an influential role in Plural's development throughout its entire run as Excélsior head editor.
Physical Description1 box
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Alphabetically, by last name and letter file (A-Z), with contents sorted chronologically starting with undated materials, then earliest to latest date.
Includes correspondence to and from Tomás Segovia who was Plural's first managing editor. Segovia left Plural after only one year after taking a visiting professor post at Princeton University in 1972.
Physical Description1 box
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Alphabetically, by last name and letter file (A-Z), with contents sorted chronologically starting with undated materials, then earliest to latest date.
Includes correspondence to and from Eusebio Rojas Guzmán who worked as Plural's public relations and as a administrative secretary. Rojas Guzmán also worked as Octavio Paz's personal secretary and such of the correspondence present here is addressed to Paz and responded to by Rojas Guzmán.
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Alphabetically, by last name and letter file (A-Z), with contents sorted chronologically starting with undated materials, then earliest to latest date.
The consecutivo series consists of single file correspondence folders for Plural personnel Ana María Cama, Audrey de la Rosa, and Ignacio Solares. Also found here are letters with illegible or unknown senders sent to Octavio Paz and Danubio Torres Fierro. The general correspondence folder consist of letters addressed to Plural in general.
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Alphabetically, by last name and letter file (A-Z), with contents sorted chronologically starting with undated materials, then earliest to latest date.
Includes typescripts "Cuando Pienso En Aquella Época...", "Homenaje a Jacques Monod" and "El Reino y las Tinieblas" attributed to Tomás Segovia and collaborators; and a typescript of Luz Aurora Pimentel's essay, "Relaciones espacio-temporales y su significación en "El hombre muerto" de Horacio Quiroga".
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Labelled "4 colaboraciones" in inventory.
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