Asturias’s Ashes Return to Guatemala After 52 Years

The ashes of Nobel Prize-winning Guatemalan writer Miguel Ángel Asturias returned from France after 52 years, with President Bernardo Arévalo and family members welcoming them in Guatemala City. A traditional Mayan ceremony at the Kaminal Juyú archaeological site honored Asturias, with Nobel Peace Prize laureate Rigoberta Menchú urging Guatemalans to keep his memory alive by reading his work. Asturias, who died in exile in 1974, was stripped of his citizenship after the 1954 coup; his novels challenged dictatorship and drew on Indigenous mythology, helping shape Latin American literature. His family agreed to the return after Arévalo took office, and his remains are to be interred at a cultural center bearing his name.