Elías Nandino (April 19, 1900 – October 3, 1993) was a Mexican poet.
Biography
Nandino was born in
Cocula, Jalisco. As a boy, he was brought up in the
Catholic
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
religion and served as an
altar boy
An altar server is a lay assistant to a member of the clergy during a Christian liturgy. An altar server attends to supporting tasks at the altar such as fetching and carrying, ringing the altar bell, helps bring up the gifts, brings up the book ...
.
He also attended Catholic school.
Nandino's first
homosexual encounters were apparently initiated by Catholic
priest
A priest is a religious leader authorized to perform the sacred rituals of a religion, especially as a mediatory agent between humans and one or more deities. They also have the authority or power to administer religious rites; in partic ...
s he knew.
Nandino was friends with boys who were able to express their homosexual desires secretly and discreetly at the schools.
Nandino studied medicine in Cocula and
Guadalajara and finally at the
Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
The National Autonomous University of Mexico ( es, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, UNAM) is a public research university in Mexico. It is consistently ranked as one of the best universities in Latin America, where it's also the bigges ...
(UNAM) in
Mexico City
Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital city, capital and primate city, largest city of Mexico, and the List of North American cities by population, most populous city in North Amer ...
where he "graduated as a
surgeon in 1930."
From 1928 to 1934, he lived in Los Angeles, where he completed his medical internship.
Nandino was influenced to start writing poetry when he was seventeen, by Manuel M. Flores and writer,
Manuel Acuña
Manuel Acuña Navarro (27 August 1849 – 6 December 1873) was a 19th-century Mexican writer. He focused on poetry but also wrote some novels and plays. He committed suicide at age 24. It is not certain why he killed himself, but it is thought tha ...
.
His was first published at age nineteen in ''Bohemia'', in Guadalajara.
At UNAM, he created the journal, ''Allis Vivere'', where students could publish their own poems and short writing.
''Allis Vivere'' led to Nandino meeting ''
Los Contemporáneos'' ("The Contemporaries" in Spanish), a Mexican modernist group of poets.
He was influenced early on by
Xavier Villaurrutia and
José Gorostiza.
Nandino worked as a surgeon at different hospitals during most of his life, during which he also wrote poetry.
He was also open about his homosexuality, but this did not affect his career as a surgeon.
His early poetry was rather sombre, focusing on topics like death, nighttime and dreams. From the 1950s his poetry became more personal, whereas his later poems combined eroticism and metaphysics.
In 1982, he met and had a strong influence on the Chicano poet,
Francisco X. Alarcón who was impressed with Nandino's bravery in living his life as an openly gay man in Mexico City. Nandino wished to support younger gay writers.
He became Alarcon's "role model and soul mate."
He was editor of several publications and promoter of writing workshops. In the last years of his life he received numerous awards both for his career as a poet and for his support to literature in Mexico, such as the Aguascalientes National Poetry Prize (1979) and the
National Prize for Literature (1982). He died in
Guadalajara, Jalisco at the age of 93.
Poetry
Nandino's poetry uses both "romanticism and symbolism" and he is very much a provocative dissident who wanted to "erode the mystique around sexuality."
His poetry often deals with contradictions in both how he felt about religion, homosexuality and eroticism.
His collection, ''Erotismo al rojo blanco/Eroticism at a Burning White'', was given Mexico's highest literary prize in 1983.
He often uses the
sonnet form.
Publications
*''Espiral'', 1928
*''Décimas a mi muerte'', 1930
*''Color de ausencia'', 1932
*''Eco'', 1934
*''Río de sombra'', 1935
*''Sonetos'', 1937
*''Poemas árboles'', 1938
*''Nuevos sonetos'', 1939
*''Nudo de sombras'', 1947
*''Espejo de mi muerte'', 1945
*''Poesía I'', 1947
*''Poesía II'', 1949
*''Naufragio de la duda'', 1950
*''Triángulo de silencios'', 1953
*''Nocturna suma'', 1955
*''Nocturno amor'', 1958
*''Nocturno día'', 1959
*''Nocturna palabra'', 1960
*''Eternidad del polvo'', 1970
*''Cerca de lo lejos'', 1979
*''Costumbre de morir a diario'', 1982
*''Erotismo al rojo blanco'', 1983
*''Todos mis nocturnos'', 1988
*''Ciclos terrenales'', 1989.
*''El coronelito'', 1991 (stories).
*''Banquete íntimo'', 1993 (edited posthumously).
*''Juntando mis pasos'', 2000 (autobiography).
*''Selected Poems'', in Spanish and English, 2010, (translated and with an introduction by Don Cellini).
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Nandino, Elias
20th-century Mexican poets
20th-century Mexican male writers
Mexican male poets
1900 births
1993 deaths
Writers from Jalisco
Gay poets
Mexican LGBT poets
20th-century LGBT people