López Vallecillos, Italo (1932–1986)

Italo López Vallecillos (b. 15 November 1932; d. 9 February 1986), Salvadoran journalist, historian, playwright, poet. As leader of the Generación Comprometida (Committed Generation) that emerged about 1950, López called for revision of Salvadoran literary values. His early poetry, most notably Imágenes sobre el otoño (1962), expressed the Committed Generation's sensitivity to the need for social change and relevance in literature. López raised Salvadoran historiography to a higher level of professionalism with his Biografía de un hombre triste (1954); El periodismo en El Salvador (1964), articles on the independence of El Salvador; Gerardo Barrios y su tiempo (1967); and many articles on twentieth-century El Salvador. As director of the press of the Universidad Centroamericana and as a frequent contributor to ECA—Estudios Centro Americanos, he was an important intellectual leader of the country in the difficult period after 1972. The versatile López also wrote plays, notably Las manos vencidas (1964), Burudi Sur (1969), and Celda noventa y seis (1975).

See alsoLiterature: Spanish America .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Luis Gallegos Valdés, Panorama de la literatura salvadoreña del período precolombino a 1980, 3d ed. (1989), esp. pp. 140, 150-153, 168, 415-445.

Additional Bibliography

Cea, José Roberto. La generación comprometida: Unos documentos y testimonios para su historia social, ética y estética. San Salvador, El Salvador: Canoa Editores, 2003.

                                 Ralph Lee Woodward Jr.