Eduardo Hughes Galeano (born 3 September 1940) is a Uruguayan journalist, writer and novelist. His best known works are Las venas abiertas de América Latina (Open Veins of Latin America, 1971) and Memoria del fuego (Memory of Fire Trilogy, 1986), which have both been translated into 20 languages and transcend orthodox genres: combining journalism, political analysis, and history. The author himself has proclaimed his obsession as a writer saying, "I'm a writer obsessed with remembering, with remembering the past of America above all and above all that of Latin America, intimate land condemned to amnesia."

This book is a monument in our Latin American history. It allows us to learn history, and we have to build on this history.”