Rosalía de Castro

Born in Santiago de Compostela in 1837, Rosalía de Castro became one of the most important writers of the Galician literary revival known as the Rexurdimento. She wrote in both Galician and Spanish at a time when publishing serious literature in Galician was unusual, and her poetry gave lasting literary force to the language.

Her best-known books include Cantares gallegos, Follas novas, and the Spanish-language collection En las orillas del Sar. Across her work, she returned again and again to homesickness, poverty, social hardship, and the inner lives of people often left out of official history.

Rosalía de Castro died in 1885, but her reputation has only grown since then. Today she is widely regarded as a defining figure in Galician culture and a writer whose clear, sorrowful, and deeply humane voice still feels close to modern readers.