An exploration of women's involvement in the Latin American Wars of Independence

Andrés Quintana Roo

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Andrés Quintana Roo

Andrés Quintana Roo

Gender:Male

Ethnic origen: White

Events:

Connections:

Texts:
1842 - Diario del Gobierno de la República Mejicana

Biography:
Born in 1787, he married Leona Vicario. He was a poet who wrote in praise of Iturbide. (Coester, 84)

He edited the weekly Sunday newspaper Semanario Patriotico Americano, in 1812.

He is described by Calderón de la Barca as “the best modern poet of Mexico” and who “is said to possess immense learning”. He studied law in Mexico City. “[He] was enthusiastic to the point of fanaticism in the cause of independence; insomuch that he and his wife, Doña Leona Vicario, who shared in his ardent love of liberty, braved every danger in its cause, suffered imprisonment, escaped from the Inquisition, from the hands of robbers, endured every privation, so that their history would form a romance. He is now devoted to literature, and although he occasionally launches forth some political pamphlet, he is probably weary of revolutions, and possesses all the calmness of a man whose first years were spent in excitement and troubles, and who at length finds consolation in study alone; the well of science proving to him the waters of Lethe, in which he drinks the oblivion of all his past sorrows."

Calderón de la Barca names him among Mexico’s “distinguished men” of literature. She adds, as a general comment, “nearly all these, at least those who are married, have had the good fortune to unite themselves with women who are either their equals or superiors, in not in education – in goodness, elevation of sentiment and natural talent”. It is possible that he attended Calderón de la Barca’s tertulias. (Calderón de la Barca, 355, 358, 360)

He was in favour of the secession of Yucatán.

Rodríguez gives his date of birth as 30 November 1787 (Merida) and his date of death as 15 April 1851 (Mexico City).

References:

Calderón de la Barca, Frances (1982) Life in Mexico
Coester, Alfred (1919) The Literary History of Spanish America
Rodríguez, Carlos (1963) Heroes de la Independencia