Alvaro Menendez Leal; Salvadoran Writer, Playwright

Alvaro Menendez Leal, 69, a Salvadoran writer whose surreal play about two executed prisoners brought international recognition to the country’s literary fraternity. A key figure in the creation of El Salvador’s literary movement, he was best known for his surreal play “Black Light” about the woes of two executed prisoners whose decapitated heads try to communicate with the living. The play was translated into eight languages. Menendez Leal lived abroad during much of the country’s civil war, teaching at UC Irvine, St. Etienne University in France, and Konstanz University in Germany. Last week he married Cecilia Periera, his fifth wife. He had nine children. On Thursday at a hospital in San Salvador of pancreatic cancer.