Eduardo Galeano was born on September 3, 1940, was a journalist and is considered one of the most influential thinkers and intellectuals of the Latin American left. Galeano began his journalistic career in the early 1960s, as editor-in-chief of Marcha, an influential weekly founded by Carlos Quijano whom he considered his “journalistic father.”
Before establishing himself as a renowned writer, he worked in different trades such as factory worker, draftsman, painter, messenger, typist and bank teller, among others. After the coup d’état of 1973 he was imprisoned and had to go into exile in Argentina where he founded the cultural magazine Crisis. His most recognized work was The Open Veins of Latin America which was published when the journalist was 31 years old and was translated into 20 different languages and suffered censorship by the military dictatorships of Uruguay, Argentina and Chile.In 1976, persecuted by the Videla dictatorship, he continued his exile in Spain. There he wrote “Memory of Fire”. In 1985 he returned to Montevideo to found the weekly Brecha, together with Mario Benedetti, among others.
In 2007, Galeano was diagnosed with lung cancer, a condition that forced him to take shelter and limit his public appearances. In 2015 after spending a week in the CASMU due to his illness, Galeano died on April 13. We remember him with some of his most remembered thoughts and phrases. “Utopia is on the horizon. I walk two steps, she moves two steps away, and the horizon runs ten steps beyond. So what is utopia for? For that, it serves to walk.” Poor versus poor, as usual: poverty is too short a blanket, and everyone pulls for his side.” Came. They had the Bible and we had the land. And they said, “Close your eyes and pray.” And when we opened our eyes, they had the land and we had the Bible.”
