The Puerto Rican Literature Project

Luis Palés Matos was born in 1898, in Guayama, Puerto Rico and died in 1959 in Santurce, Puerto Rico. He published under the pseudonyms of Pedro Gonsale and Justo Vajque. He was a poet, bookkeeper, journalist, civil servant, and educator. He attended primary and secondary school in his hometown, but, due to economic difficulties, could not complete secondary school. In 1914, he directed his school magazine Mehr Litch. He would later go on to direct the Fajardo newspaper El Pueblo from 1919 to 1920. During the 1920s he served as a representative of the political party, Alianza Puertorriqueña. Palés Matos moved to San Juan, Puerto Rico in 1921 and published in literary magazines and newspapers, such as El Imparcial, El Mundo, and La Democracia. In collaboration with the poet Jose T. de Diego Padró, he invented Diepalismo, an avant-garde literary movement focused on sounds, rhythm, and onomatopeia. Palés Matos is also credited with inventing Afro-Antillian poetry that employed African and Afro-Caribbean words, folklore, and rhythms, spurred by his publication of “Pueblo Negro” (La Democracia, 1926). Additionally, he taught at the University of Puerto Rico. His work includes Azaleas (Casa Editorial Rodríguez & Co., 1915) and Tuntún de pasa y grifería (Biblioteca de autores puertorriqueños, 1937), and Poesía, 1915-1956 (Ediciones de la Universidad de Puerto Rico, 1957).

Works Cited

“Luis Palés Matos.” Poets.org, https://poets.org/poet/luis-pales-matos. 

“Palés Matos, Luis: Poeta y escritor.” BiografíasPR, Lexjuris, 1996-2002, www.lexjuris.com/biografias/buscar/search.asp?rec_id=164.

Rodríguez Juliá, Edgardo. “Utopía y nostalgia en Pales Matos.” La Jornada Semanal, 19 April 1998, https://www.jornada.com.mx/1998/04/19/sem-julia.html.