Selected Biographies

THE COMMITTED GENERATION was a group of authors who lived and wrote in Central America during the latter half of the 20th century. Convinced that the poet must serve as the fulcrum of change in word and deed, they not only wrote tirelessly about historical and current injustice in Central America, but also worked for change abroad, in resistance movements, and in revolutionary governments. Many were exiled and some died in their efforts. Their poetry and activism continues to serve as a denouncement of injustice and a vision of hope for people in Central America and all over the world.

Authors of note include:

MANLIO ARGUETA was born in San Miguel, El Salvador. A student at the University of San Salvador, he helped found the Univeristy Literary Circle in 1956. He lived in exile in Costa Rica from 1972 until the end of the Salvadoran Civil War. His works include A Place Called Milagro de la Paz, Little Red Riding Hood in the Red Light District, Cuzcatlan: Where the Southern Sea Beats , and One Day of Life, which was banned in El Salvador during the civil war but earned fifth place on the Modern Library’s list of the 100 best Latin American novels of the twentieth century. He currently serves as the Director of the National Library of El Salvador.

ROQUE DALTON was born in Quetzaltepeque, El Salvador. After a year at the University of Santiago, Chile, he attended the University of San Salvador, where he helped found the University Literary Circle in 1956, just before the Salvadoran military set fire to the building. He was arrested in 1959, 1960, and 1965 for his political involvement with the Communist party, escaping his last imprisonment when an earthquake shattered the outer wall of his cell. He lived in exile in Mexico, Cuba, and Prague, winning the Casa de las Américas poetry prize in 1969 for his book Tavern and Other Places. In 1973, he reentered El Salvador in disguise and joined the Revolutionary Army of the People (ERP) as a soldier-poet. During the next eighteen months he wrote Clandestine Poems. As a member of the ERP, he worked to establish bonds between the guerrillas and civil society, but was accused of collaborating with the CIA and assassinated by other members of the ERP in May 1975, four days before his fortieth birthday.

CLARIBEL ALEGRíA was born in Nicaragua, but grew up in Santa Ana, El Salvador. She attended George Washington University in Washington, DC. Originally traveling through Europe with her husband and translator, Darwin “Bud” Flakoll, she became an exile when she spoke out against the Salvadoran military’s role in the assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero. A celebrated poet, novelist, and translator, her books include Luisa in Realityland, Ashes of Izalco, and I Survive , which won the Casa de las Américas prize for poetry. She currently lives in Managua, Nicaragua.

OTTO RENé CASTILLO was born in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala. He was exiled in 1954 after a CIA-sponsored coup that overthrew the democratic Arbenz government. He went into exile in El Salvador where he attended the University of San Salvador and helped found the University Literary Circle. He returned to Guatemala in 1957, but went into exile again in Europe. In 1966, he returned to Guatemala to join the FAR (Revolutionary Armed Forces). He was captured by government forces the following year, along with Nora Paiz, and was interrogated and tortured before being burned alive.  His poetry is found in Tecum Oman , Let’s Go!, and Tomorrow Triumphant.

RIGOBERTA MENCHú was born in Chimel, Guatemala to a peasant family. Her family, of the Mayan K’iche, was active in grassroots organizing for land reform and women’s rights. As a catechist in the Catholic Church, she also became involved with social reform.  After the murders of her brother, father, and mother by Guatemalan military forces, she joined the Committee of the Peasant Union and the 31st of January Popular Front, rebel groups in the Guatemalan Civil War. She was forced to flee to Mexico in 1981, and there dictated the book I, Rigoberta Menchu to anthropologist Elizabeth Burgos.  The testimony gained her international renown, and in 1992, she won the Nobel Peace Prize for her work on behalf of indigenous rights.  She continues to advocate for indigenous rights, and ran for the Guatemalan presidency in 2007.

HUMBERTO AK’ABAL was born in Momostenango, Guatemala.  He grew up in a Mayan K’iche peasant village, and moved to Guatemala City to work as a street vendor.  In the 1980s he began to write in K’iche, but although he translated his own poems into Spanish, he could not find a publisher willing to print his work until 1992. Since then, he has won many prizes for his poetry, including the 2004 Guatemala National Prize in Literature, which he turned down because it is named for Miguel Asturias. Ak-abal explains that Asturias’ 1923 essay, The Social Problem of the Indian, contributed to the marginalization of the indigenous peoples of Guatemala. His works include Poems I Brought Down from the Mountain, Drum of Stone, and Honeyword .

SERGIO RAMíREZ was born in Masatepe, Nicaragua. In the 1960s, he gained prominence as an intellectual and participated in the resistance against the Somoza government. He declared his support for the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) in 1977 as a member of the Group of Twelve, leading members of civil society who spoke out against Somoza. Ramírez was part of the transitional revolutionary junta in 1979, and was elected vice president in 1984. He broke with the FSLN in 1996, and now works primarily as a writer. His works include Cuentos and Margarita, está linda el mar.

GIOCONDA BELLI was born in Managua, Nicaragua. She joined the FSLN (Sandinista National Liberation Front) in 1970 and was involved in the underground resistance movement until 1975 when she had to flee the Somoza regime’s secret police and go into exile. When the Sandinistas came to power in 1979, she held various government positions, working primarily in communications, journalism, and public relations. She left the Sandinista Party in 1993 is now a vocal critic of the Ortega government. Her works include The Inhabited Woman, The Country Under My Skin, and Line of Fire , which won the Casa de las Americas Prize in 1978. Belli’s website.

ERNESTO CARDENAL was born in Granada, Nicaragua. Ordained a Catholic priest in 1965, from 1965-1977 he lived in the Solentiname Islands, where he helped found the peasant artist colony which originated primitivist style painting. He was a close collaborator with the FSLN (Sandinista National Liberation Front), and after the revolution, served as the Minister of Culture for the new government from 1979-1987. He left the FSLN in 1994, and is now part of the Sandinista Renovation Movement (MRS). His works include Zero Hour, The Doubtful Straight, Psalms, and The Gospel of Solentiname.