William H KatraWilliam H. (Bill) Katra is an independent scholar residing in La Crosse, Wisconsin. He served in the Peace Corps in Uruguay from 1966 to 1968. Although his academic degrees are in Latin American literature and culture (UC-Berkeley, B.A. 1970; UM-Ann rbor Ph.D. 1977), his publications are mostly historical. His 2017 book, José Artigas and the Federal League in Uruguay's [and Argentina's] War of Independence (1810-1820), is the second book in English to treat this important chapter of Latin America's history. His 1996 book, The Argentine Generation of 1837: Esteban Echeverría, Juan B. Alberdi, Domingo F. Sarmiento, Bartolomé Mitre--(published in Buenos Aires as Los que hicieron el país) was preceded by three other book-length studies and offers perhaps the most authoritative treatment available about those four key figures in Argentine political and intellectual history. He served as a contributing editor for the Library of Congress' Handbook of Latin American Studies: Humanities (1990, 1992, 1994), and as guest editor for a special issue of Fairleigh Dickinson University's The Literary Review treating Argentine Writing in the Eighties (Summer 1989). He has also published highly regarded articles or book chapters treating: a history of liberation theology in Latin America; the Facundo as historical novel; Sarmiento's travels to the United States; an ideological history of Uruguayan literature; the narrative of Mexican writer, Juan Rulfo; a Mexican liberation-theology hymnal; and the poetic tradition of the gaucho. In a different tone, his Mountain Climber: A Memoir was published in 2020. Read More Read Less