Journalists - Ecuadorian Literature

Mariella Toranzos

Mariella Toranzos Narváez (Guayaquil, January 24, 1988) is an Ecuadorian journalist, poet, and editor. Before becoming the Society editor for the daily newspaper Diario Expreso, she worked at the paper as a news reporter covering politics, and, as the sub-chief of its Guayaquil section, covering cultural topics. She has also written features on contemporary Ecuadorian authors, helping to introduce them to wider audiences. As a poet, she has participated in the Ileana Espinel Poetry Festival as well as other literary events in Guayaquil.

Humberto Vacas Gómez

Humberto Vacas Gómez (Quito, 1913-Quito, 2000) was an Ecuadorian writer, literary critic, poet, journalist, and diplomat. As a journalist, his career is tied to the Quito daily newspaper El Comercio. He served as the Minister of Education between 1963 and 1964 and President of the National Union of Journalists. He was a lifelong supporter of democracy and was persecuted by past totalitarian governments for this reason. In 1937, he published his first book of poems, “Canto a lo oscuro,” which was praised by Isaac J. Barrera in his book “Historia de la Literatura Ecuatoriana.” Vacas’ nonfiction books include “La educación artística de las masas,” “Panorama de la pintura ecuatoriana,”and “Los Estados Unidos que yo vi.” A school in Quito bears his name.

Simón Espinosa Cordero

Simón Espinosa Cordero (Cuenca, October 8, 1920) is an Ecuadorian writer, journalist, editor, and university professor. He became a member of the Ecuadorian Academy of Language in 2013. He has a PhD from the Pontifical Catholic University of Ecuador. He has authored over one hundred essays, prologues and nearly three thousand opinion columns, his books include “Comunicación, ética y paz social” (1990, co-author), “Presidentes del Ecuador 1830-2000” (2002), “Grandes escritores de la patria” (2004) and “Los más bellos cuentos del poeta” (2011, co-author). In 2014 he published his latest book, “Vine, vi, linché,” a collection of 124 opinion columns he wrote between 1982 and 2012.

Joselías Sánchez Ramos

Joselías Sánchez Ramos (Tarqui) is a distinguished Ecuadorian historian, writer, essayist, journalist, and esteemed university professor, renowned for his expertise in the local history of Manabi. As a respected member of the House of Ecuadorian Culture in Manabi, he contributes significantly to the preservation and promotion of cultural heritage. Sharing his vast knowledge, he teaches at the prestigious Universidad Laica Eloy Alfaro of Manabi. Notably, among his remarkable body of work stands the acclaimed publication titled “Manta, 1.500 años de vida histórica y la racionalidad de la identidad manabita,” [Manta, 1,500 Years of Historic Life and the Rationality of the Manabite Identity] a profound exploration of the historical tapestry and the profound essence of the Manabite identity.

Family.

With his wife Cecilia he has 4 children and 9 grandchildren.

Works

Manta, 1.500 años de vida histórica y la racionalidad de la identidad manabita

Fernando Escobar Páez

Fernando Escobar Páez (Quito, 1982) is an Ecuadorian writer, poet and journalist. His first book, “Los ganadores y yo,” was a poetry collection published in 2006. His second book, “Miss O´gginia,” was a book of short stories which won several awards and was published in six countries, including Spain, Argentina and Chile. He has also published the poetry collections, “Escúpeme en la verga” (2013) and “Tu retorno con aliento a biberón, peluche y verga ajena” (2018). His work has been published in over twenty anthologies of poetry and journalistic chronicles, both in Ecuador and abroad. Some of his work has been translated into several languages, including English, German, Portuguese, Russian, and French.

Margarita Borja

Margarita Borja (Quito, 1983) is an Ecuadorian writer, journalist, translator, and literary critic. She has lived in Leipzip, Germany since 2007, where her daughters were born and raised. Since 2012 she has written an international opinion column for the Ecuadorian newspaper El Universo. In 2015, she published a collection of 32 of her opinion columns as a book, “Una latina en Alemania: historias de dos mundos” [A Latina in Germany: Stories of Two Worlds]. Her articles have appeared in numerous publications.

Sabrina Duque

Sabrina Duque (Guayaquil, 1979) is an award-winning Ecuadorian journalist, writer, and translator. She was a finalist for the 2015 Gabriel García Márquez Journalism Prize in the Text category for her work “Vasco Pimentel, el oidor.” In 2017, she published “Lama,” a non-fiction account of the survivors of Bento Rodrigues and Paracatú de Baixo, communities in central Brazil devastated by a flood of toxic mud from a mining dam failure. She won the The Michael Jacobs Prize for Travel Writing in 2018 for her book “VolcáNica.” She has lived in Portugal, Costa Rica, Brazil, and Nicaragua, where she conducted research on active volcanoes, and she now resides in the United States. Some of her work has been translated into English, Italian and Portuguese.

César Salcedo Parrales

César Salcedo Parrales, pseudonym Galo Salcedo (Machala, Ecuador, August 22, 1938 – August 16, 2011) was an Ecuadorian writer, painter, educator, journalist and historian. He authored approximately 13 books and several articles for various publications. He primarily wrote historical works about Machala and the province of El Oro. He was a member of the Association of Latin American and Caribbean Historians, the Association of Historians of Ecuador, and the House of Ecuadorian Culture’s history section in El Oro. The provincial historical archive bears his name.

Orlando Pérez

Orlando Pérez Sanchez (Quito, 1963) is an award-winning journalist and writer from Ecuador. In 2002 he published, “La celebración de la libertad,” a collection of interviews with nine writers from Latin America and Spain. In 2013 he published a novel, “La ceniza del adiós,” and a nonfiction book, “Wikileaks en la mitad del mundo,” about the U.S. diplomatic cables in Ecuador published by Wikileaks. In 2014 he co-authored “Caso Chevron: la verdad no contamina” with Nelson Silva.

César E. Arroyo

César E. Arroyo (Quito, 1887 – Cádiz, 1937) was an Ecuadorian poet, novelist, journalist, playwright and diplomat. He was Ecuador’s Consul in Vigo from 1912 to 1916, and Ecuador’s Consul in Madrid from 1917 to 1919. He later served as Consul in Santander and Cadiz. He co-founded the Madrid-based magazine Cervantes (1913-1921) with the Spanish poet Francisco Villaespesa.

Pedro Jorge Vera

Pedro Jorge Vera (Guayaquil, June 16, 1914 – Guayaquil, March 5, 1999) was an Ecuadorian journalist, novelist, short story writer, playwright, poet, university professor, and a politician from the Communist Party of Ecuador. He published and contributed to several controversial newspapers and magazines, such as “La Calle”, with the writer Alejandro Carrión, and “La Mañana”. He remained throughout his life a close friend of Cuban president Fidel Castro. Vera was the paternal uncle of Prima Ballerina Noralma Vera Arrata.

Jorge Martillo

Jorge Martillo Monserrate is an award-winning poet and has been a columnist for various newspapers. He was born on May 2, 1957 in Guayaquil, Ecuador. He has published the poetry books: Aviso a los navegantes (1987); Fragmentarium (1991); Confesiorarium (1996) and Vida póstuma (1997). He was awarded the Aurelio Espinosa Pólit Prize (1991).