Pablo Neruda
1904–1973
Chile's Nobel poet; from the Twenty Love Poems to the Canto General he gave the continent its most passionate voice.
Signature worksTwenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair · Canto General · Elemental Odes
Masters and Luminaries of Latin American Letters and Culture
Masters and Luminaries of Latin American Letters and Culture
The voice of a continent — where history, myth and the modern collide across the Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking Americas.
The Literary Universe
This land’s masters across the centuries
★ Suggested first work to enter the reader: García Márquez — One Hundred Years of Solitude
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Poetry
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Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz
1648–1695
The great poet-nun of colonial Mexico; her verse and defense of learning make her a founding voice of the Americas.
Signature worksFirst Dream · In Reply to Sor Philothea · Redondillas
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César Vallejo
1892–1938
Peru's poet of anguish and solidarity; Trilce broke and remade the Spanish language.
Signature worksTrilce · The Black Heralds · Human Poems
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Octavio Paz
1914–1998
Mexican Nobel laureate whose verse ranks with the century's finest; poet first, and author of the essay The Labyrinth of Solitude.
Signature worksSun Stone · The Labyrinth of Solitude · The Collected Poems
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Philosophy
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José Martí
1853–1895
Cuba's poet-revolutionary; his essay Our America defined the continent's independent identity and conscience.
Signature worksOur America · The Golden Age
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Culture
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Gabriel García Márquez
1927–2014
One Hundred Years of Solitude gave the world magical realism and Latin America its defining modern novel.
Signature worksOne Hundred Years of Solitude · Love in the Time of Cholera · Chronicle of a Death Foretold
Jorge Luis Borges
1899–1986
Argentine master of the labyrinth; his Ficciones turned the short story into infinite mirrors of thought.
Signature worksFicciones · The Aleph · Labyrinths
Julio Cortázar
1914–1984
Central figure of the ‘Boom’; Hopscotch is a novel of radical invention that reinvented how fiction can be read.
Signature worksHopscotch · Blow-Up and Other Stories
Gabriel García Márquez
Габриэль Гарсиа Маркес1927–2014
Nobel laureate of magical realism, whose Macondo turned a family's century into the myth of a whole continent.
Signature worksOne Hundred Years of Solitude · Love in the Time of Cholera
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History
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Inca Garcilaso de la Vega
1539–1616
Son of an Inca princess and a conquistador; his Royal Commentaries preserve the memory of the Inca world.
Signature worksRoyal Commentaries of the Incas
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Eduardo Galeano
1940–2015
Open Veins of Latin America wrote the continent's history as a wound and an indictment.
Signature worksOpen Veins of Latin America · Memory of Fire
Sérgio Buarque de Holanda
1902–1982
His Roots of Brazil is a founding work of cultural history, bringing the Portuguese-speaking Americas into the canon.
Signature worksRoots of Brazil