Gabriel Celaya

Gabriel Celaya (full name: Rafael Gabriel Juan Múgica Celaya Leceta; March 18, 1911, in Hernani, Gipuzkoa – April 18, 1991, in Madrid) was a Spanish poet. Gabriel settled in Madrid and studied engineering, working for a time as a manager in his family's business.[1]

Gabriel Celaya
Commemorative plaque at his Madrid residence
Born	Rafael Gabriel Juan Múgica Celaya Leceta (1911-03-18)March 18, 1911 Hernani, Gipuzkoa, Spain
Died	April 18, 1991(1991-04-18) (aged 80) Madrid, Spain
Language	Spanish
Nationality	Spanish
Period	20th Century
Genre	Poetry
Notable works	Open World

Gabriel met Federico García Lorca, José Moreno Villa and other intellectuals who inspired him towards writing around 1927-1935, after which he devoted his writing entirely to poetry. In 1946 he founded the collection of the poems "Norte" with its inseparable Amparo Gastón and since then, he abandoned his engineering profession and his family's business.

The poetry collection "Norte" was intended to bridge between the gap of the poetry of the generation of 1927, the exile and Europe.

In 1946, he published the prose book "Tentativas" in which he signed as Gabriel Celaya for the first time. This is the first stage of existentialist character.

Along with Eugenio de Nora and Blas de Otero, he supported the idea of a non-elitist poetry in the service of the majority, "to transform the world".

In 1956, he won the Critics Award for his book "De claro en claro".

When this model of social poetry was in crisis, Celaya returned to his poetic origins. He published 'La linterna sorda' ('The lantern deaf') and reedited poems belonging prior to 1936. He also tested the experimentalism and concrete poetry 'Campos Semánticos'('semantic fields') (1971).

Between 1977 and 1980 their Obras Completas were published in five volumes. In 1986 he won a national prize for Spanish literature by the Ministry of Culture, the same year when he published “Open world”.

In short, the work of Celaya is a great synthesis of almost all the concerns and styles of Spanish poetry of 20th century.

Celaya died on April 18, 1991, in Madrid and his remains were scattered in his native Hernani.