Washington Benavides (3 March 1930 – 24 September 2017) was a

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 ...

an poet, profesor and musician.

Writing career

Benavides was born in

Tacuarembó Tacuarembó ( Guarani: ''Takuarembo'', literally: "Bamboo shoot") is the capital city of the Tacuarembó Department in north-central Uruguay. Location and geography The city is located on Km. 390 of Route 5, south-southwest of Rivera, the c ...

. During the 1950s, Benavides contributed to the magazine ''Asir''. In 1955, he published his first book , a satire of various personalities in his native city. After that he devoted himself heavily to poetry, eventually earning himself a place among the most important Uruguayan poets of his generation. During the dictatorship of

Juan María Bordaberry Juan María Bordaberry Arocena (; 17 June 1928 – 17 July 2011) was a Uruguayan politician and cattle rancher, who served as constitutional President from 1972 until 1973, and then ruled as the head of a civilian-military dictatorship up t ...

, he promoted the revolutionary possibilities of popular music. Benavides taught literature at the secondary level. He later joined the Faculty of Humanities and Educational Sciences in the Department of Modern and Contemporary Letters of the

University of the Republic, Uruguay The University of the Republic ( es, Universidad de la República, sometimes ''UdelaR'') is Uruguay's oldest public university. It is by far the country's largest university, as well as the second largest public university in South America and t ...

. He also worked in radio broadcasting. His poems have been set to music by

Daniel Viglietti Daniel Alberto Viglietti Indart (24 July 1939 – 30 October 2017) was an Uruguayan folk singer, guitarist, composer, and political activist. He was one of the main exponents of Uruguayan popular song and also of the ''Nueva Canción'' or "New ...

Alfredo Zitarrosa Alfredo Zitarrosa (March 10, 1936 – January 17, 1989) was a Uruguayan singer-songwriter, poet and journalist. He specialized in Uruguayan and Argentinean folk genres such as zamba and milonga, and he became a chief figure in the ''nueva canci� ...

, Héctor Numa Moraes, and Eduardo Darnauchans, such as in the songs "", Bismark Vega "", "", "", "", and "". Washington died in Montevideo, Uruguay on 24 September 2017 at the age of 87.

Works

* (1955) * (1959) * (1962) * (1963) * (1966) * (1968) * (1968) * (1971) * (1975) * (1979) * (1981) * (1985) * (1986) * (1990) * (1991) * (1993) -Premio Nacional y Municipal- * (1994) * (1995) * (1998) * (2000) * (2000) * (2001) * (2004) * (2006)

External links

*
Songs and milongas by Washington Benavides

Washington Benavides recorded at the Library of Congress for the Hispanic Division's audio literary archive on June 16, 1977Contemporary Uruguayan Poetry: A Bilingual Anthology by Ronald Haladyna
includes several poems by Benavides followed by English translations.

References

1930 births 2017 deaths People from Tacuarembó Uruguayan people of Spanish descent 20th-century Uruguayan poets Uruguayan male poets Uruguayan musicians Academic staff of the University of the Republic (Uruguay) 20th-century Uruguayan male writers {{Uruguay-musician-stub