Posts - Ecuadorian Literature

Francisco Granizo Ribadeneira

Francisco Granizo Ribadeneira (Quito, November 8, 1925 – January 21, 2009) was an Ecuadorian poet, professor and diplomat. He was a professor at Ecuador’s Central University and the director of the House of Ecuadorian Culture’s radio station. He published several poetry books, including “Por el breve polvo” (1948), “La piedra” (1958), “Nada más el verbo” (1969), “Muerte y caza de la madre” (1978), “Sonetos del amor total” (1990) and “El sonido de tus pasos” (2005). He also wrote a verse drama, “Fedro” (2005). In 2001, he published his only novel, “La piscina,” for which he received the Joaquín Gallegos Lara Prize for best novel of the year. Through the protagonists Fernando and Lilí, the book examines loneliness and the impossibility of finding love, two frequent themes in Granizo’s works.

Santiago Páez

Santiago Páez Gallegos (Quito, 1958) is an Ecuadorian writer known for his novels, short stories, and science fiction works. In his youth, he traveled through the jungles of the Ecuadorian coastal region, lived in the mangroves of Esmeraldas province, and explored the highlands of the central inter-Andean region. At the age of 19, he wrote his first novel but was dissatisfied with it, leading him to stop writing for about 11 or 12 years. During his time in Madrid studying and caring for his newborn son, Páez found solace in writing science fiction stories during his sleepless nights. This experience reignited his passion for writing, prompting him to focus on fiction and pursue an academic career. After obtaining his doctorate in Madrid, he returned to Quito in 1990. Páez is currently a professor at the Pontifical Catholic University of Ecuador. Among his notable works are novels like “La reina mora” (1997), “Pirata Viejo” (2008), and “Olvido” (2010), as well as short story collections such as “Profundo en la galaxia” (1994) and “Ecuatox” (2013). Páez has received recognition for his writing, including the Joaquín Gallegos Lara Award for his short story collection “Profundo en la Galaxia” (1994) and the Darío Guevara Mayorga Award for his book “El secreto de la ocarina” (2009) and the crime novel “Retratos De Dios” (2016).

Fernando Cazón Vera

Fernando Cazón Vera is an Ecuadorian poet, columnist, editor, and university professor. He was born in Quito on June 5, 1935 and has lived in Guayaquil most of his life. He comes from a family of well-known cultural figures in Ecuador, including his uncles Pedro Jorge Vera (1914-1999), who was an acclaimed writer, and Alfredo Vera Vera (1910–1999), who as Minister of Education promoted the establishment of the House of Ecuadorian Culture in 1944, in addition to his cousin Noralma Vera (1936-), an important figure of the Ecuadorian ballet. His first book of poetry, “Las canciones salvadas,” was published in 1957 by the House of Ecuadorian Culture after being read and championed by the organization’s founder, Benjamn Carrión. He has worked as a columnist or editor for newspapers and magazines such as La Hora, Expreso, Extra, La Nación, and La Razón for more than 50 years. He was twice president of the House of Ecuadorian Culture’s Guayas chapter. President Lenin Moreno bestowed Ecuador’s highest honor, the Eugenio Espejo Award in Literature, on Cazón in 2018.

Alejandro Carrión Aguirre

Alejandro Carrión Aguirre (Loja, March 11, 1915 – Quito, January 4, 1992) was an Ecuadorian poet, novelist and journalist. He wrote numerous poetry books, short story books, and the novel La espina (1959). As a journalist he published many articles under the pseudonym “Juan Sin Cielo.” He was the nephew of the writer Benjamín Carrión and the naturalist Clodoveo Carrión. He was a recipient of the Maria Moors Cabot Prize (1961) from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He also was awarded the Eugenio Espejo Award (1981), Ecuador’s highest literary honor.

Osvaldo Hurtado

Luis Osvaldo Hurtado Larrea is a former president of Ecuador (1981-1984) and within Ecuador he is one of the most widely read political scientists. He was born in Chambo, a city in the Chimborazo Province of Ecuador, on June 26, 1939. He is the author of an influential book on Ecuadorian politics entitled El Poder Político en el Ecuador (English: “Political Power in Ecuador”). In 1979, Hurtado was chosen as the running mate of presidential candidate Jaime Roldós Aguilera, a member of the populist political party Concentración de Fuerzas Populares (English: “Concentration of People’s Forces”). Roldós won the election, becoming the first freely-elected president of Ecuador after the rule of the military juntas in the 1970s, with Hurtado as his Vice President. On Sunday, May 24, 1981, Roldós died in a plane crash and therefore Hurtado became the 34th President of Ecuador, serving out the rest of Roldós’ term.

Alfredo Pareja Diezcanseco

Alfredo Pareja Diezcanseco was an Ecuadorian novelist, essayist, journalist, historian and statesman. He was born in Guayaquil on October 12, 1908 and died in Quito on May 1, 1993. He was part of a literary group called the “Group of Guayaquil,” whose members utilized realism in their stories. The other members of the group were José de la Cuadra, Joaquin Gallegos Lara, Demetrio Aguilera Malta and Enrique Gil Gilbert. Among the many government posts he held throughout his lifetime, he was elected to the Constituent Assembly in 1944 and was made Minister of Foreign Affairs in 1979. In 1979 he was awarded the Eugenio Espejo Award, the most important literary prize in Ecuador.

Ernesto Quiñonez

Ernesto Quiñonez is an American novelist born in Ecuador in 1969. He was raised in Spanish Harlem, New York City, by a communist father from Ecuador and a Jehovah’s Witness mother from Puerto Rico. He is a product of public education from kindergarten to his Masters at the City College of New York where he studied under the American novelist Walter Mosley. Quiñonez’s debut novel, Bodega Dreams, was published in 2000, which the New York Times declared “a New Immigrant Classic”. In an interview with Publisher’s Weekly, Quiñonez said “My goal, in all three of my books, including Chango’s Fire, is to bring magical realism to the barrios, make it more urban.” His work has received the Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers designation, the Borders Bookstore Original New Voice selection, and was declared a “Best Book” by the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times. He is currently an Associate Professor at Cornell University where he teaches Narrative Writing and Honors Essay Tutorial courses.

Salomon Isacovici

Salomon Isacovici (Sighetu Marmaţiei, Romania, 1925 – February 1998) was a businessman based in Ecuador who also penned a memoir detailing his survival experiences during the Holocaust. Born in Romania in 1924, he spent challenging years in Auschwitz and Gross-Rosen concentration camps before being liberated by U.S. soldiers. After the war, he moved to Ecuador, leaving behind the devastation of his homeland. In Ecuador, Isacovici worked his way up from modest beginnings to become a successful businessman, demonstrating his resilience and determination. His experiences during the Holocaust were vividly captured in his co-authored book, “Man of Ashes”, an award-winning memoir that shed light on his experiences as a Romanian Jew during one of history’s darkest periods. Isacovici’s died of cancer in 1998, but his legacy continues to endure through his impactful memoir, serving as a testament to the human capacity for survival and renewal.

José Trajano Mera

José Trajano Mera Iturralde was an Ecuadorian poet, playwright and diplomat with a literary and cultural heritage. He was born in Ambato in 1862 and died in Guayaquil in 1919. His father was the famous author Juan Leon Mera who wrote Ecuador’s first novel Cumanda (1877) and the Ecuadorian national anthem (1865). Trajano earned a degree in jurisprudence from the Central University of Ecuador. He died in Guayaquil in 1919 while holding the position of Undersecretary of the Ministry of Foreign Relations.

José María Egas

José María Egas (Manta, November 28, 1897 – 1982) was an Ecuadorian poet, lawyer, journalist and university professor. Many of his poems have been turned into the lyrics of “pasillos,” a genre of music very popular in Ecuador. Egas studied law at the University of Guayaquil, graduating in 1927. He was then active as a lawyer and journalist, but became best known for his poetry, being appointed national poet laureate in 1976. His poem “Plegaria Lírica” has appeared in several American and European Anthologies and is reproduced every year in “The Hundred Best Poems in the Spanish Language,” which is published in Madrid, Spain. Egas worked as a professor at the University of Guayaquil. He was the brother of the poet Miguel Augusto Egas, best known by his pen name Hugo Mayo.

Ulises Estrella

Ulises Estrella Moya was an Ecuadorian poet, writer, professor and film expert. He was born in Quito on July 4, 1939 and died in the same city on December 27, 2014. In 1962, together with Marco Muñoz he co-founded Tzantzismo, a cultural movement of 1960s Ecuador, whose members had a revolutionary attitude and which was mainly expressed in poetry, and to a lesser extent in stories and theater. Estrella directed the film department of the House of Ecuadorian Culture for over 30 years. Among his best known works are: Clamor (1962), co-written with the Argentinian writer Leandro Katz, which marked the beginning of Tzantzismo, and Fuera del Juego (1983), winner of the Jorge Carrera Andrade Prize, Quito.

Euler Granda

Euler Granda (Riobamba, June 7, 1935 — Portoviejo, February 22, 2018) was an Ecuadorian poet, writer, and psychiatrist. In the second half of the 1950s, he was a member of the poetic group Club 7. Later, in 1962, he was one of the founding members of the Tzántzico group in Quito, which urged a fundamental transformation in Ecuador’s approach to literature and culture. Granda is the author of 17 books of poetry. Among the honors he has received are: two first-place finishes in the Ismael Pérez Pazmio National Poetry Contest (1961 and 1996), the Jorge Carrera Andrade Municipal Poetry Prize (1988), and the Jorge Luis Borges Poetry Prize. He was also a judge for the Casa de las Américas Award (Havana, Cuba). In 2009 he was awarded the Eugenio Espejo Prize, Ecuador’s highest literary honor.

Francisco Arízaga Luque

Francisco Arízaga Luque was an Ecuadorian poet, writer and politician. He was born in Lima, Peru on February 6, 1900, while his father was exiled by the liberal regime of Eloy Alfaro, and died in Guayaquil, Ecuador on October 22, 1964. Arízaga served as the President of Ecuador from July 14, 1925 to January 10, 1926 as part of the First Provisional Government. Other public posts he held include Minister of Public Education and Ambassador of Ecuador to the United Kingdom and Venezuela.

Hugo Mayo

Miguel Augusto Egas Miranda (Manta, November 24, 1895 – Guayaquil, April 5, 1988), better known by his pen name Hugo Mayo, was an Ecuadorian avant-garde poet and a key figure in 20th-century Latin American literature. Described in the Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics as “one of the most influential figures of the 20th century,” Mayo embraced movements like Dadaism, Ultraism, and Creacionismo, challenging conventional poetic forms. Although he wrote most of his poetry while living in Guayaquil, much of it was published outside of Ecuador, leading to greater recognition in countries like Argentina and Peru, where he was regarded as one of the best poets of his time. His most famous work, El zaguán de aluminio (1982), was reconstructed from memory after the original manuscript was lost in 1922, marking a significant moment in his literary legacy.

Ernesto Noboa y Caamaño

Ernesto Noboa y Caamaño (Guayaquil, August 2, 1889 – Quito, December 7, 1927) was an Ecuadorian poet. Together with Arturo Borja, Humberto Fierro and Medardo Ángel Silva, Noboa was part of the group of poets known as the “Decapitated Generation,” so called for the premature death of its members. This group represents the apogee of the modernismo literary movement in Ecuador. Almost all of Noboa’s work, marked by anxiety and loathing, was collected in a book entitled “Romanza de las Horas” (Romance of the Hours), published in 1922. For some, his poem “Emoción vesperal” (Vesperal Emotion) marked a new era of poetry in Ecuador. The poem, which speaks about taking an afternoon trip to sea without a set course, with sorrow dying as the day dies out, is an allegory for death. He is one of the most read poets in Ecuador, and many of his poems are recited and sung by the people.