By Nicholas Asheshov ✐ Peruvian Times Contributing Writer
On Saturday, March 7, earlier this month, a cheerful memorial service was held at Great St Mary’s Church, the University Church in Cambridge, in honor of Michael Kuczynski, the distinguished Peruvian economist.
A Memorial for Michael Kuczynski (1941-2025) at Cambridge
Great St Mary’s stands at the heart of one of the world’s great institutions of learning, and the nave was filled with some 500 academics, friends, and admirers who had come to say farewell to Michael, an Emeritus Fellow of Pembroke College and its longtime Director of Studies.
Music, Memory, and Michael’s Eccentric Charm
A chamber orchestra, a string quartet, the great church organ, and a choir of rare quality performed works by Bach, Brahms, Fauré, and others between speeches recalling Michael’s contributions to Keynesian economics and to generations of students.
There was affectionate mention, too, of his elegantly Anglo-Peruvian eccentricities, among them his reflections on how to mix a properly Keynesian martini — shaken, not stirred — and the way such things somehow found their place in the Kuczynski universe of teaching and conversation.
Former students recalled discovering, beneath mountains of old essays and theses in his rooms, not only a grand piano but even, once, a cat.
Recollections of Youth and Family
John Hemming, an Oxford contemporary of Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, Michael’s older brother, told Fredy Cooper and me how the Master of Pembroke read aloud an account from Pedro Pablo of Michael’s youthful attempt to escape the grim, cold boarding school they attended in Britain and make his way instead to the Peruvian embassy in London.
Pedro Pablo Listens from Lima
Pedro Pablo himself was not permitted to attend his brother’s memorial service. Nor, for that matter, has he been allowed to travel freely for medical treatment abroad. In the case of the memorial to Michael, however, Cambridge made it possible for him to listen from his home in San Isidro to a livestream from Great St Mary’s, thousands of miles away.
Michael’s Final Months and PPK’s Ordeal
Michael had died in Lima three months earlier, suddenly, while on one of the visits he regularly made to accompany his older brother. Since Pedro Pablo’s departure from the presidency in 2018, his circumstances have been severely restricted, and his supporters regard his treatment by the authorities as both excessive and unjust.
Whatever one’s politics, it is difficult not to see something bleak in the spectacle of an elderly former president, in frail health, prevented from traveling even for urgent medical reasons or to honor his own brother.
No conviction has been obtained against Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, yet the investigations and restrictions around him have dragged on for years, while Peru’s political class has continued its melancholy parade of mediocrity, scandal, and institutional decay. Some of those who helped bring about his downfall have themselves since fallen into disgrace. Such are the ironies of Peruvian public life.
A Funeral in Lima
Michael was cremated in Lima, and Pedro Pablo, together with friends and family, was at least allowed to attend the funeral in La Molina.
A Barred Journey to the Mayo Clinic
Some months ago, Pedro Pablo had completed the paperwork required to travel to the United States for treatment at the Mayo Clinic. Yet at the airport he was prevented from boarding, reportedly under orders issued at the last minute by the government of the day. It was one more humiliation added to a long and unnecessary list.
Remembered with Dignity and Honor
Pedro Pablo is now 87 and has not been able to see his wife Nancy, who remains in Wisconsin, for eight years. Many Peruvians, I think, will take some comfort in knowing that Michael Kuczynski was honored with warmth, dignity, sad good cheer, and the full measure of respect due to a serious scholar and public-minded man.
John Hemming tells me that after the splendid Anglican memorial service at Great St Mary’s, the guests were invited to the ancient courts and lawns of Pembroke College for champagne and canapés. One cannot help feeling that this is how a civilized society ought to bid farewell to men such as the Kuczynski brothers.
