Víctor Manuel Rendón Pérez (

Guayaquil Guayaquil (), officially Santiago de Guayaquil, is the largest city in Ecuador and also the nation's economic capital and main port. The city is the capital (political), capital of Guayas Province and the seat of Guayaquil Canton. The city is ...

, December 5, 1859 –

, October 9, 1940) was an

Ecuadorian Ecuadorians () are people identified with the South American country of Ecuador. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Ecuadorians, several (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source o ...

writer, poet, novelist, playwright, biographer, translator, doctor, diplomat, pianist and composer.

Biography

Rendón's father Manuel Eusebio Rendón Treviño was a writer and his mother Delfina Pérez Antepara was an artist. They moved to France while he was still very young and completed all of his studies there. He graduated from the

University of Paris The University of Paris (), known Metonymy, metonymically as the Sorbonne (), was the leading university in Paris, France, from 1150 to 1970, except for 1793–1806 during the French Revolution. Emerging around 1150 as a corporation associated wit ...

with a medical degree, with a thesis titled "Fièvres de surmenage" (Fevers of Overwork) which was published in 1888. In 1889 he returned to Guayaquil to practice medicine. He got his first books to read from his mother and his maternal aunt Carmen Pérez de Rodríguez Coello who was a poet and playwright. He was appointed the Consul General in Paris by the President of Ecuador

Eloy Alfaro José Eloy Alfaro Delgado (25 June 1842 – 28 January 1912) often referred to as "The Old Warrior," was an Ecuadorian politician who served as the President of Ecuador from 1895 to 1901 and from 1906 to 1911. Eloy Alfaro emerged as the leader ...

in 1895. Between 1903 and 1914 he served as Minister Plenipotentiary of Ecuador to the governments of France and Spain, and in 1907 he was a delegate to the Second International Conference of The Hague. He was a member of the International Permanent Court of Arbitration and the International Red Cross. In 1914 he was sent to Barcelona to direct the building of the monument to commemorate the heroes of the "October 9 Battle", for which his name is engraved in the pedestal of its column. He wrote the novel "Lorenzo Cilda" in 1906 in French. His own Spanish translation of the book got him accepted to the Ecuadorian Academy of Language in 1921. The book also earned him a Gold Medal from the

Académie Française An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of tertiary education. The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy, founded approximately 386 BC at Akademia, a sanctuary of Athena, the go ...

on April 3, 1925. He translated many works from Spanish to French, including a 1904 translation of the poetry of José Joaquín de Olmedo. He also wrote a biography about Olmedo in French titled: ''Olmedo homme d' etat et poete americain, chantre de Bolívar''. He spoke 4 languages, and wrote over 40 books in Spanish and French, which were published in France, Spain, Belgium, Italy, Portugal and Ecuador. He was nominated for the

Nobel Prize in Literature The Nobel Prize in Literature, here meaning ''for'' Literature (), is a Swedish literature prize that is awarded annually, since 1901, to an author from any country who has, in the words of the will of Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel, "in ...

in 1935 by Celiano Monge, the secretary of the Ecuadorian Academy of Language, but did not win. On two separate occasions he rejected the Presidential nomination of Ecuador.

Family

He was married to María Seminario Marticorena with whom he had five children: * Miguel, a French writer *

Manuel Rendón Manuel may refer to: People * Manuel (name), a given name and surname * Manuel (Fawlty Towers), Manuel (''Fawlty Towers''), a fictional character from the sitcom ''Fawlty Towers'' * Manuel I Komnenos, emperor of the Byzantine Empire * Manuel I ...

, a celebrated painter, member of the École du Paris in the 20s, who was married to Paulette Everard Kiefer, author of the book "Galapagos: The Last Enchanted Islands" (published in 1947 under the name Paulette E. de Rendón as ''Galápagos: las últimas islas encantadas'') * Teresa * Margarita * Isabel, a charity nun.Victor Manuel Rendon Perez – The Ecuadorian Biographical Dictionary (Spanish)
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Works

* Héros des Andes (1904) * Flammes et Cendres (1905) * Cuadro heroico (1937) * Madrinas de guerra (1937) * Hoy, ayer y manana (1928) * El Ausentismo (1937) * Con Victoria y Gloria Paz (1937) * Periquin o la noche sabrosa (1937) * En fuente florida (1937) * Salus populi (1928) – a drama about the execution of Dr. Santiago Viola in Guayaquil – considered one of his best works. * Charito (1937) * Almas hermosas (1937) * El billete de loteria (1937) * Las tres Victorias (1930) * La caretilla (1937) * Telefonemas (1908) * Telepatías (1908) * La Columna de los Próceres del 9 de Octubre (1916) * Clemente Ballén (1916) * Ecos de Amor y Guerra» (1929) * Lorenzo Cilda (1906) * Obras Dramáticas» (five volumes, 1927–1931) * Cuentos del Delfín de las Peñas» (1934) * Notes de mon carnet (1882) * Documentos para la historia del Ecuador (1896) * Héroes des Andes, poemas en francés (1904) * Olmedo, homme d'etat et poete americain, chantre de Bolívar (1905) * Las frontière de la Republique de l'Equateur (1914) * Biografía de Clemente Ballén (1916) * Le Revenant (1917) * La columna a los próceres del 9 de octubre (1917) * Ecos de amor y guerra (1927). * Encantos patrios (1929) When he died in 1940 he left behind unfinished books such as ''Juan Montalvo'', ''El doctor José Recamier'' and ''Escritores ecuatorianos''.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rendon Perez, Victor Manuel 1859 births 1940 deaths Ecuadorian expatriates in France People from Guayaquil Ecuadorian poets Ecuadorian novelists Ecuadorian dramatists and playwrights Ecuadorian translators Ecuadorian physicians Ecuadorian pianists Ecuadorian composers Ecuadorian diplomats University of Paris alumni Ecuadorian male poets Ecuadorian male novelists Male dramatists and playwrights