TheArgentine lawyer and writer was 84 years old and had been fighting a serious illness. “Falucho” as his friends used to call him, was the author, among other works, of ‘A Brief History of the Argentineans’. He also founded and directed the magazine ‘Todo es Historia’.
Luna was born in Buenos Aires to a family originally from La Rioja Province, in 1925.
He enrolled at the University of Buenos Aires and earned a law degree in 1951. He was first published in 1954, with his biographical work, Yrigoyen.
Opposed to the populist President Juan Perón, his 1955 overthrow led to Luna’s appointment as Director of the Ministry of Labor’s Employee Benefits Plan in 1956.
Luna received his first literary prize in 1957 for his period tale, La fusilación (The Firing Squad); set in the nineteenth century, the work followed the controversial 1956 execution of General Juan José Valle and 27 others.
This was followed by a biography of Marcelo Torcuato de Alvear, Yrigoyen’s chief rival within the UCR, in 1958.
Luna collaborated with pianist and composer Ariel RamÃrez as a lyricist for what arguably became the best-known work for either man: the Misa Criolla (Creole Mass), in 1964.
