Ecuadorian literature

[9][10] On his part, fellow literary critic Marcelino Menéndez y Pelayo had considered Bastidas to be originally from Seville, making the latter's discovery quite controversial.

[a][18] In addition to Aguirre, one work that also stands out is the poetry collection Los jesuitas quiteños del extrañamiento, edited by Espinosa Pólit and published in 1960.

It includes works by Jesuit writers who were ousted from the Real Audiencia of Quito by King Charles III[19] and who spent the rest of their lives around the city of Faenza, Italy.

Canto a Bolívar—which Simón Bolívar himself objected to at first, due to Olmedo having included Sapa Inca Huayna Capac as one of the protagonists[26]—and Canción al 9 de octubre—which was chosen as the anthem of the city of Guayaquil, with music composed by Ana Villamil Icaza.

[32] Regarding romantic narrative, one of its representatives is author Juan León Mera (Ambato, 1832–1894), whose works are considered classics of Ecuadorian and Spanish-speaking literature.

[46] The four members of modernismo in Ecuador were Medardo Ángel Silva (1898–1919) and Ernesto Noboa y Caamaño (1891–1927), from Guayaquil; and Arturo Borja (1892–1912) and Humberto Fierro (1890–1929) from Quito.

[7] However, the book that marked the appearance of social themes in literature is Los que se van, a compilation of short stories by Guayaquil-born writers Demetrio Aguilera Malta (1909–1981),[69] Joaquín Gallegos Lara[70] (1909–1947) and Enrique Gil Gilbert (1912–1973).

[71] All these writers were committed to social issues and were determined to show the reality of the cholo montubio through popular parlance, harsh scenes, profanity, and other resources.

[75] The numerous works produced by the members of this group include classics such as Los Sangurimas by José de la Cuadra, Nuestro pan by Enrique Gil Gilbert, Las cruces sobre el agua by Joaquín Gallegos Lara, Siete lunas y siete serpientes by Demetrio Aguilera Malta, and Baldomera by Alfredo Pareja Diezcanseco.

[81][82] Trying to find a unifying theme in the narrative approaches by the generation of writers of the 1930s is an arduous task, due to the amount of criticism and comments that make it ambiguous to categorize the principles and ideals of a minor literature such as the one from Ecuador.

[...] used to the commentary and study of individual and isolated values in the history of Ecuadorian literature, [who] failed to grasp and interpret in due time and in its proper perspective [...] the unifying character, in attitude and spirit, of what it meant and how much it represented for the national culture [...] the literary work of the writers of the 1930 generation—the mestizo form, the underlying emotion, the delineation of the Hispano-American personality.

Moreover, Icaza mentions that this unifying spirit beat in the three groups of Ecuadorian writers located in Guayaquil, in Quito, and in Loja, despite the regional differences, in a country that was in the evolutionary stage of development, forming a society that sought a destiny in the political, economic, and literary spheres, where the capital cities of the montubios, cholos, and indigenous peoples incorporated the presence of national themes in the literature.

[84] Authors and representative works of the 1930s generation include: Ecuadorian narrative gained strength once again starting in the 1970s, coinciding with the appearance of major literary magazines such as La bufanda del sol, which began to be published in 1972.

[87][88] During this period, novelist Alicia Yánez Cossío (Quito, 1928–) burst onto a literary scene that until then had been dominated by male figures, thanks to the publication in 1973 of her acclaimed novel Bruna, soroche y los tíos.

[86][89] The latter was followed by more than a dozen novels that cemented Yánez's place as the great Ecuadorian author of the 20th century,[89] with a style that mixed criticism of the status of women in society and the search for the mestizo identity with magical realism.

[94] In poetry, César Dávila Andrade (Cuenca, 1918–1967) especially stands out, although also important are: Efraín Jara Idrovo (Cuenca, 1926–2018), Alejandro Carrión (Loja, 1915–1922), Iván Carvajal (San Gabriel, 1948–), Julio Pazos Barrera (Baños, 1944–), Humberto Vinueza (Guayaquil, 1942–2017), Carlos Eduardo Jaramillo Castillo (Loja, 1932–), Euler Granda (Riobamba, 1935–2018), Fernando Nieto Cadena [es] (Quito, 1947–2017), Sonia Manzano Vela, Luis Alberto Costales (Riobamba, 1926–2006)—considered one of the "absentees" of the Eugenio Espejo Award—[95][96] and Adalberto Ortiz (Esmeraldas, 1914–2003).

[101] The latter two have described wretched and horrific settings in their work to explore violence, power relations, and family ties,[102][103] in titles such as Nefando (2016), Mandíbula (2018), and Pelea de gallos (2018).