Maria Eugenia Vaz Ferreira (1875–1924) was an Uruguayan teacher and poet. She was the younger sister of philosopher Carlos Vaz Ferreira and a contemporary of

Delmira Agustini Delmira Agustini (October 24, 1886 – July 6, 1914) was an Uruguayan poet of the early 20th century. Biography Born in Montevideo, Uruguay, she began writing when she was ten and had her first book of poems published when she was still a tee ...

and

Julio Herrera y Reissig Julio Herrera y Reissig (January 9, 1875 – March 18, 1910) was a Uruguayan poet, playwright and essayist, who began his career during the late Romanticist period and later became an early proponent of Modernism. Background He was the son ...

. She was born and lived in Montevideo, the capital of

Uruguay Uruguay (; ), officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay ( es, República Oriental del Uruguay), is a country in South America. It shares borders with Argentina to its west and southwest and Brazil to its north and northeast; while bordering ...

. She held a Chair in Literature at the Women's University. She suffered from mental illness and lost her reason some years before her death in 1924. Her first volume of is entitled ''La isla de los canticos'' and consists of forty selected poems (and a single poem ''Unico poema'' added at her brother's insistence) which he published shortly after her death. A second volume, entitled ''La otra isla de los canticos'', with a prologue by Emilio Oribe and containing a number of poems taken from her unpublished manuscripts, appeared in 1959 shortly after her brother's death. The modern ''Poesías Completas'' contains 112 poems. Vaz Ferreira is regarded as a metaphysical poet who wrote emotive poems that speak of passion, death, hope, and the mysteries of love and existence. She was also a musician, and the Lauro Ayestarán collection contains one of her manuscript scores with verses and music. Contrasting myths have been built around her life. She has been idealised as, on the one hand, a type of ''consumptive virgin'' but, on the other hand, a Sandesque cigar-smoking crossdresser notorious for practical jokes.

Posthumous works

* ''La isla de los canticos'', 1925 * ''La otra isla de los canticos'', Impresora Uruguaya, Montevideo, 1959 *
Poesías Completas
', Hugo J. Verani, Ediciones de la Plaza, 1986, 292 pp

Bibliography

* ''Antología de Poetisas Americanas'', Parra del Riego, Juan, Montevideo, 1923, Pages 7–25. * ''100 autores del Uruguay'', Paganini, Alberto, Paternain, Alejandro, Saad, Gabriel, Capítulo oriental, Montevideo. * ''Parthenon West Review (Issue Four)'' eds Holler, David and Sweeney, Chad contains some translations by Liz Henry.

External links

Biography
(in Spanish)

(in Spanish)

(in English) 1875 births 1924 deaths People from Montevideo Uruguayan people of Portuguese descent 20th-century Uruguayan poets Uruguayan women poets 20th-century Uruguayan women writers {{Uruguay-writer-stub