Philosopher of formation, lover of the short forms and the whiskey, bibliophile that preferred the life to the books, poet, musical critic and palindromista, LUIS IGNACIO HELGUERA (Mexico DF, 1962-2003) was a writer in whom lived the excess and Containment, overflowing passion and intelligence. His amphibious prose, difficult to classify into a single genre, ranges from personal essay to chronicle, from quick story to aphoristic joke, in an incessant race against heaviness and foolishness. He was a cultivator of rarities, a rarity himself as the writers and chess players he admired. Helguera saw things from the affectionate distance of humor, a corrosive, sometimes grim humor, faithful to the tragicomic character of existence.