Literary works, manuscripts and objects belonging to the Salvadoran writer Tirso Canales, were delivered to the Museum of the Word and the Image by Alma Benítez Molina, the poet’s wife, as part of an effort to fix the memories of the political and literary legacy of the Engaged Generation.
Tirso Canales, was born in Los Planes de Renderos on March 26, 1931. The writer cultivated poetry, lyrics, short stories, criticism and essays. He was a member of the Communist Party. He began as a writer at the Círculo Literario Universitario. In 1967 he published the collection of poems “De aquí en adelante” together with Roberto Armijo, Manlio Argueta, José Roberto Cea and Alfonso Quijada Urías. Among his published works are: Rain in the wind, (poetry, 1959). The Artist and the Chronicles of the Fig Trees and other poems, (1970). One Hundred Years of Salvadoran Poetry: 1800-1900, The Colonels and Other Salvadoran Tragedies (1981). Cachimbón town, among others. He was director of the University Editorial. For disseminating and defending his ideas through political and literary militancy, Tirso Canales was imprisoned on several occasions. He lived in Guatemala, Mexico and Costa Rica. He passed away in San Salvador, on June 29, 2022.
The MUPI has undertaken an effort to rescue and digitize the legacy of Tirso Canales and his colleagues from the Committed Generation, with special interest in completing the collection of the humorous newspaper “La Jodarria”, from which intellectuals such as Roque Dalton lashed out at military dictatorships. .