Jorge Guillén

Born Jan. 18, 1893, in Valladolid. Spanish poet.

In 1938, Guillén emigrated to the USA, but he has been living in Europe since 1958. His first verses appeared in 1919. Guillén belonged to the group of so-called apolitical poets, opposing both decadent and “social” poetry, defending abstractly humanist ideals in his poetry, and glorifying simple human feelings. His verses are collected in the book Cántico, on which Guillén worked for more than 20 years, expanding it with each edition (1928, 1936, 1945, and 1950); he added the subtitle “Faith in Life” to the third edition. The verse collection Confusion (1957), which reflects Guillén’s anti-Francoist position, is banned in Spain. In 1960 he completed the cycle of elegies Affirmation (partially published).