GARCA LORCA, FEDERICO

born June 5, 1898, Fuente Vaqueros, Granada province, Spain died August 18 or 19, 1936, between Vznar and Alfacar, Granada province Spanish poet and playwright who, in a career that spanned just 19 years, resurrected and revitalized the most basic strains of Spanish poetry and theatre. He is known primarily for his Andalusian works, including the poetry collections Romancero gitano (1928; Gypsy Ballads) and Llanto por Ignacio Snchez Mejas (1935; Lament for Ignacio Snchez Mejas, Eng. trans. Lament for a Bullfighter), and the tragedies Bodas de sangre (1933; Blood Wedding), Yerma (1934; Eng. trans. Yerma), and La casa de Bernarda Alba (1936; The House of Bernarda Alba). In the early 1930s Lorca helped inaugurate a second Golden Age of the Spanish theatre. He was executed by a Nationalist firing squad in the first months of the Spanish Civil War. Leslie Anne Stainton