When the Mexican novelist and essayist Carlos Fuentes, who died May 15, visited Zócalo for an interview with Andrés Martinez in the fall of 2007, he talked about place, and places.

Los Angeles, he said, was a “confusing and beautiful” city that left him disoriented, puzzled, and still “very much at home.” He spoke of his life in London, and his appreciation both for its literary history (Dickens was his favorite) and for its “cold” and “miserable” present; the lack of warm people and good food made it an easy place to get writing done without distraction. And he discussed the difficult but improving relationship between Mexico and the U.S.—whose government had barred him from the country in the early 1960s because of his ideas. …

by Tamar Jacoby

In July 1959, JFK had dinner with Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. at Hyannis Port, and late in the evening over drinks and cigars, the politician told the historian what he really thought of the sitting president. “No man is less loyal to old friends than Eisenhower,” Kennedy said with what Schlesinger later described as “contempt.” Eisenhower was “terribly cold and terribly vain,” Kennedy continued. “In fact, he is a shit.” …