And the independent journalist, activist and poet John Ross has died. Ross covered social movements in Mexico and Latin America for nearly 50 years. He authored 10 books, including his latest El Monstruo: Dread and Redemption in Mexico City. In a Democracy Now! interview last April, Ross talked about how he first came to the Mexican capital.

John Ross: “I went to Mexico in 1957 with a number of younger Beat poets. We were much younger than the Jack Kerouacs and Allen Ginsbergs. We were about 15—well, not so much younger than Allen, but certainly than Kerouac and Burroughs. We were about 15 years younger. But we had contact with them in New York. I come from the Village. I was born in the Village, and my contact was always with poets and artists, and came to Mexico in 1957, returned in 1958. And I didn’t go on the road. I mean, all the Beats were always on the road. I came and stayed. And I lived for seven years in a small indigenous village in the mountains of Michuacán. And truly, you know, I’ve been very close to the Zapatista movement during the last 16 years. And I could have not been close to the Zapatista movement, if I hadn’t spent so many years living in an indigenous community and understanding the dynamic of indigenous life in rural Mexico.”