Roque Dalton
Roque Dalton was a prominent Salvadoran poet and political activist, born in San Salvador, El Salvador. Initially named Roque García, he was the illegitimate son of nurse Marcía García and wealthy Irish-American Winnal Dalton. Dalton's education at the prestigious Externado de San José and his studies in Chile, where he was influenced by notable figures like Pablo Neruda, led him to adopt Marxist beliefs, moving away from his Catholic upbringing. Throughout his life, he was deeply engaged in political activism, editing a student publication and forming the "engaged generation" group. His literary contributions, including the award-winning works "Dos puños por la tierra" and "El turno del ofiendido," reflected the violence and injustice in El Salvador.
Dalton faced persecution for his political views, leading him to flee to Mexico, Cuba, and Europe, where he continued to write and further develop his ideology. Despite his commitment to revolutionary ideals, his life was tragically cut short in 1975 when he was executed by the Revolutionary Army of the People, falsely accused of espionage. Posthumously, Dalton has become an enduring symbol of hope and resistance for the Salvadoran people, celebrated for his contributions to literature and his unwavering commitment to social change.
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Roque Dalton
Poet
- Born: May 14, 1935
- Birthplace: San Salvador, El Salvador
- Died: May 10, 1975
Biography
Political activist and poet Roque Dalton was born in San Salvador, El Salvador. His given name was as Roque García; he was the illegitimate son of nurse Marcía García and Winnal Dalton, a wealthy Salvadoran of Irish-American origin. He spent his childhood with his mother, and his father financed his education at the Externado de San José, a prestigious Jesuit high school.
Following graduation, he adopted his father’s last name and traveled to Chile, where he enrolled at the National University in Santiago. There he came under the influence of Pablo Neruda and Diego Rivera and abandoned his Catholic faith for Marxism. When he returned to El Salvador, he enrolled in the law school of the National University. For seven years he edited Opinión Estudiantil (student opinion) and with some colleagues established the “engaged generation,” a group of politically engaged people. In 1955, the year he married Aída Díaz, he and René Castillo published Dos puños por la tierra (two fists for the land), which won them a literary prize.
In 1957, he and his family went to Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, where his political beliefs hardened. He returned to El Salvador, but in 1961, he had to flee with his wife and three sons to Mexico because a military regime came to power. There he studied at the National School of Anthropology and History for two semesters before he went to Cuba. In 1962, he won an award from the Casa de las Américas for El turno del ofiendido (the turn of the offended one).
He went back to El Salvador, published El Salvador: Monografía, a history of the violence and injustice in his native land, and was captured and imprisoned in Cojutepeque. After he escaped, he went to Cuba and then on to Europe, where he lived in Prague from 1965 to 1967 and wrote political essays for the Canadian-based World Marxist Review. While in Prgaue, he met Miguel Mármol, who had been involved in the revolt known as “the slaughter,” in which the Izalco Indians of El Salvador were almost wiped out. Dalton’s account of the event was later published in 1972.
In 1969, his Taberna, y otros lugares (tavern, and other places) won the Casa de las Américas Award in Havana, and he resigned from the Salvadoran Communist Party. In the early 1970’s, he was in Chile, Cuba, and North Vietnam, all left-leaning or Communist countries, and he published Dalton y CIA in which he fictionally traces his ancestry to the American outlaw gang known as the Daltons.
In 1973, he went back to El Salvador, where he joined the radical Revolutionary Army of the People, and four years later he published Poemas clandestinos. That same year he was accused of spying for a foreign government, tried, and sentenced to death by the Revolutionary Army of the People. He was shot to death. Since his death, Dalton has become an icon, a symbol of hope; and he has become the voice of his people, even in death.