Eduardo Hughes Galeano, (1940 - 2015) was an Uruguayan journalist, writer, poet and novelist. Among his many books, Galiano's best-known works are "Las venas abiertas de América Latina" (Open Veins of Latin America, 1971) and ""Memoria del fuego" (Memory of Fire Trilogy - 1982–6). "I'm a writer," the author once said of himself, "I am obsessed with remembering, with remembering the past of America and above all that of Latin America, intimate land condemned to amnesia. His first or paternal surname is Hughes and the second or maternal family name is Galeano. His two family names were inherited from Welsh and Italian great-grandfathers; the other two were from Germany and Spain. Galeano wrote under his maternal family name.