Dalmiro Sáenz, Argentine playwright, Died at 90

  Writer

Dalmiro Antonio Sáenz was born on June 13, 1926, in Buenos Aires and died on September 11, 2016.

He was an Argentinian writer and playwright.

He started his literary activity early on, and began to publish by his 30’s, after he traveled during several seasons by ship through the Patagonia, he settled there for almost 15 years, where he developed his first storybook: “Seventy Times Seven,” which won the prestigious award of Editorial Emecé, and became a bestseller, based in a vision that is violent, erotic, and with solid precepts and moral questions about religion.

Which became the hallmark of Sáenz for several years.

And critics agree in indicating that a religious axis always passes through the stories of this author; either through one of his characters, or as in “Christ Pie”, where religiosity is in controversy with the established religion, as opposed to the individual dialogue that the character have with God).

Then later on, he participated in the screenplay adaptation for the big screen of the two stories in “Seventy Times Seven”, that were joined to assemble the frame for the homonymous film directed by Leopoldo Torre Nilson (1962).

Then Sáenz won the Award of Life magazine in Spanish, in 1963, with his storybook “No”.

During that same year, Dalmiro won the award Argentores by the Sociedad Argentina de Autores with “Thirty Thirty”, a tale raised in the manner of an American western, but located in Patagonia.

During 1964 Dalmiro published in the Editorial Emecé “The Necessary Sin”, a novel that was later adapted to create the script for the film version, called “Nobody heard Cecilio Fuentes scream ” directed by Fernando Siro, and winner of the Silver Shell (Concha de Plata) in the International Film Festival of San Sebastian, Spain (1965).

Thereafter he started to write plays and very soon he was awarded the prize “Casa de las Américas”, in Cuba in 1966, with “Hip Hip Ufa”, published by Editorial Emecé, and was adapted to create the script for the film version with the title “Ufa with sex” under the direction of Rodolfo Kuhn -1972.

During 2004 he published “As A Writer” with some formulas on how he wrote his best stories, and the novel “Pastor Of Bats” (Gárgola Ediciones, 2005)

Most of his writings have been translated and published in different languages, and his stories show up in numerous compilations, as in “Latin Blood” by Donald Yates (The best crime and detective stories of South America / Editorial Herder and Herder New York 1972); or “The Best Patagonian Narrations” by Mary Belts & Cristian Aliaga, Editorial Ameghino Buenos Aires 1988, among others.

He resided in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Dalmiro Sáenz passed away at 90 years old.