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Federico Garcia Lorca Quotes

Federico Garcia Lorca
  • Mini Bio
  • Name: Federico Garcia Lorca
  • Born: 5th June 1898, Granada, Andalusia, Spain
  • Died: 19th August 1936, Alfacar, Granada, Spain
  • Alma mater: University of Granada
  • Occupation: Poet and playwright
  • Height: 5' 7" (1.7 m)
  • Best known poetry: Canciones (Songs) and Romancero Gitano (The Gypsy Ballads)
  • Best known plays: Blood Wedding and the House of Bernarda Alba
  • Trivia: Official documents released by Granada police in the 1960's proved the Franco regime were responsible for his execution

"As I have not worried to be born, I do not worry to die"

Federico Garcia Lorca

"I get the impression that I can produce anything here, no matter how daring it is, because the public has tremendous respect for its authors" [about Buenos Aires]

Federico Garcia Lorca

"Songs are creatures, delicate creatures that must be carefully tended so that no part of their rhythm is altered"

Federico Garcia Lorca

"For my dear Pablo, one of the few great poets I've had the good fortune to love and know" [about Pablo Neruda]

Federico Garcia Lorca

"The uncouth Madrid crowds ... stomp their feet the moment you give them something they don't understand"

Federico Garcia Lorca

"Today in my heart a vague trembling of stars, but my way is lost in the soul of the mist"

Federico Garcia Lorca

"To burn with desire and keep quiet about it is the greatest punishment we can bring on ourselves"

Federico Garcia Lorca

"The gypsies are a theme. And nothing more. I could just as well be a poet of sewing needles or hydraulic landscapes"

Federico Garcia Lorca

"The theatre is a school of weeping and of laughter"

Federico Garcia Lorca

"To see you naked is to recall the Earth"

Federico Garcia Lorca

"Understand one single day fully, so you can love every night"

Federico Garcia Lorca

"The day we stop resisting our instincts, we'll have learned how to live"

Federico Garcia Lorca

"Love is the kiss in the quiet nest while the leaves are trembling, mirrored in the water"

Federico Garcia Lorca

"The hurt of my sadness moistens memories in thought’s fountain"

Federico Garcia Lorca

"Here I have spent the best days of my life" [about Cuba]

Federico Garcia Lorca

"Don't look at me any more! If you want, I'll give you my eyes"

Federico Garcia Lorca

"The moon is dead - it will come back to life in the spring"

Federico Garcia Lorca
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Federico Garcia Lorca Biography

A bright light went out on 19th August 1936 when officials of the dictatorship of General Franco arrested Federico Garcia Lorca and took him away to be executed the same day.

Lorca posthumously still caused problems for the regime with so many unanswered questions that would not go away simply because he was and he remained the highest profile casualty of the Spanish civil war.

The inspiring words of his poetry and dramatic twists of his plays helped immortalise him in the eyes of not just the Spanish people because the whole world got to know of his work and subsequent fate.

In 1920's Spain he had a close friendship with Salvador Dali who both shared a mutual respect for each others work. Dali helped with stage settings and decorations for Lorca's play Mariana Pineda when it opened in Barcelona and Dali's fascination with gypsies was thought to have influenced Lorca to write his most successful poetry collection The Gypsy Ballads.

He was a great man whose words and poetry inspired many including myself, so this is my compilation of 17 of the best Federico García Lorca quotes.

Quotes About Federico Garcia Lorca

A 1937 Falangist press article denounced his murder: "The finest poet of Imperial Spain has been assassinated"

The author Richard Burgin described him thus: "Lorca had a gift for gab. For example, he makes striking metaphors ... I think that he was fond of playing words against each other, the contrast of words"

Arturo Cambours showed him the sites of Buenos Aires and was not impressed by his inflated ego: "Spanish poetry began and ended with him. The Spanish theatre began and ended with him. Yerma, whose third act he had to finish would be the consummation of Greek tragedy"

The exasperated Arturo Cambours went on to accuse him of being a: "conceited fool, a fat and petulant little charlatan"

The Chilean poet Pablo Neruda was more upbeat with his description of Lorca: "He squandered his imagination, he spoke with enlightenment ... he cracked walls with his laughter, he improvised the impossible, and in his hands a prank became a work of art. I have never seen such magnetism and such constructiveness in a human being"


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