Laura Esquivel

Mexican writer and politician. She is internationally known for her work "Como agua para chocolate" published in 1989, translated into more than 30 languages. From 2008 to 2011 she held the position of General Director of Culture in Coyoacán, Mexico City. From 2015 to 2018, she was a federal Representative for the Movimiento de Regeneración Nacional (Morena), the party created by former presidential candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador, a party she represented in the commissions of Science and Technology, Culture and Cinematography, and Environment and Natural Resources.

She studied Theater and Dramatic Creation at the Centro de Arte Dramático A.C. (CADAC), specializing in Theater and Dramatic Creation. (CADAC) specializing in Children's Theater. She is a graduate in Preschool Education (1966-1968), instructor of the Children's Theater and Literature Workshop (1977), instructor of the Tlaxcala and Oaxaca Script Consultant Workshop (1998 - 2002) and Instructor of the Writing Laboratory Workshop in Oaxaca, Michoacán and Spain (1999).

Between 1970 and 1980 she wrote children's programs for Mexican television, and in 1983, she founded the Centro de Invención Permanente, made up of artistic workshops for children, and assumed its technical direction.

Her television work gave her the stimulus to devote herself to writing screenplays for film. It was then that she decided to write her first novel. "Como agua para chocolate" (Like water for chocolate) was a great commercial success. The film version would be directed by Alfonso Arau Quirós, to whom she was married from 1975 to 1995.

In this novel, she uses magical realism, proclaims the importance of the kitchen as the most important part of the home, and promotes personal and family changes as a form of inner revolution.