EMBLEMATIC FESTIVAL OF ECUADOR

The Guayaquil International Poetry Festival Ileana Espinel Cedeño was born to bring together the world's leading poets in Guayaquil and to remember the literary legacy of the great Guayaquil poet Ileana Espinel Cedeño. In this year 2021 we reached the fourteenth edition of a Festival that has established itself as one of the most important Festivals in Latin America. The Ministry of Culture and Heritage of our country designated us as the Emblematic Festival of Ecuador, on two occasions.

 

Despite the complexity of this year's edition of the festival, which was forced to go from a face-to-face and blended structure to a totally virtual one, we will have a program of multiple poetic acts performed by 80 poets from 18 countries for 7 days . We will have poets from all continents, especially from Africa and Asia. The Festival will be broadcast via Facebook Live, Zoom and YouTube.

 

It is the oldest, largest Festival, with the most public attending and the most poets summoned in Ecuador. This year we reached poets from: Taiwan, Spain, China, Brazil, Japan, Poland, Cameroon, Argentina, the United States, Italy, Uruguay, Chile, Mexico, Palestine, Colombia, Cuba, Costa Rica, Ecuador.

 

Important poets such as Antonio Gamoneda, Darío Jaramillo, Kemadjou Raconteur, Rafael Courtoisie, Luis Armenta Malpica, Margarito Cuéllar, Reina María Rodríguez, among other outstanding international poets added to important Ecuadorian poets, will participate. We will have as special guests the Spanish editor Manolo Borrás and the writer Luisgé Martín who will accompany us on this literary event.

 

The Guayaquil International Poetry Festival Ileana Espinel Cedeño is proudly part of the World Poetry Movement and New Voices of the World Poetry Movement. I also appreciate the support of all cultural institutions, especially the Salesian Polytechnic University of Guayaquil.

 

As is known worldwide, our country and especially Guayaquil was hit hard by Covid-19, the list of deaths is very long. There are many defeated people, destroyed families, broken dreams, a lot of fear. We believe today more than ever that poetry and literature can help unite people, invite them to dream, to re-believe in the human being in its immense and beautiful complexity.

 

This is the poetry festival of Ecuador. I hope you enjoy it.

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Augusto Rodriguez

director