González Martínez, Enrique

Related Category: Latin American Literature: Biographies

(ānrē´kā gōnsä´lĕs märtē´nĕs), 1871–1952, Mexican poet, physician, and diplomat. His early poetry, written during the 17 years of his medical practice, showed the influence of the modernist Rubén Darío and the French symbolists. In 1911 he rejected the artificial aestheticism of modernismo in his poem Los senderos ocultos [hidden paths], beginning with the famous exhortation, “Wring the necks of the deceitful swans.” He served in later years as ambassador to Argentina, Chile, and Spain. He collected and edited his poetry in three volumes of Poesias (1938–40).