Francisco Brines

Francisco Brines was a Spanish poet born in 1932 in Oliva, Valencia. He is one of the greatest Spanish poets of the postwar generation and a central figure in the poetic movement known as the Generation of the 50s, alongside figures such as Jaime Gil de Biedma, Ángel González, and Claudio Rodríguez. His poetry is a sustained meditation on time, memory, and the beauty of the world that is passing. Brines published his first collection El Santo Inocente in 1965 and went on to produce a substantial body of work over six decades, including El otoño de las rosas (1986), La última costa (1999), and La vida entera (2004). His poetry is characterized by a gentle, autumnal melancholy, a sense of the preciousness of life in the face of its inevitable end. He received the Premio Cervantes in 2020 — announced in 2021 due to the pandemic — and the ceremony was held despite his declining health. The prize recognized a lifetime of quiet, profound achievement in Spanish poetry. Brines died in May 2021 in Valencia. He is remembered as one of the most beloved Spanish poets of his era, a figure of enormous gentleness and wisdom.