MEXICO CITY (AP) — Sergio Pitol, the celebrated Mexican author, essayist and translator and winner of the most prestigious award for literature in the Spanish-speaking world, died Thursday. He was 85.

Family members and Alberto Salamanca, a spokesman for the Mexican government's Department of Culture, said Pitol died in the morning at home in Xalapa, Veracruz state, of natural causes.

Born March 18, 1933, Pitol was known for such works as "Mephisto's Waltz" and his "Trilogy of Memory," which included "The Art of Flight," ''The Journey" and "The Magician of Vienna."

He won the prestigious Cervantes Prize in 2005, and also was awarded Mexico's National Literature Prize in 1983 and the Juan Rulfo Latin American and Caribbean Prize in 1999.

Cousin Luis Demeneghi, who said he considers Pitol more of an older brother, said the writer had been ill for a long time with kidney problems and underwent surgery last year.

"I think he was one of the great writers the Mexico had in the last century and in this one," Demeneghi told The Associated Press by phone. "'The Magician of Vienna' is truly a masterwork."