Explanation:
Ecuadorian writer born in Ambato in 1832 and died in the same place in 1894. Insigne polygraph, author of the lyrics of the national anthem, is distinguished by his admiration for the indigenous, feeling that reflected in his narrative writings, especially in his novel Cumandá. He/She spent his childhood, austere and poor, in the finca Los Molinos, near Atocha, where he/she acquired the basics in classes that his uncles gave him. In 1852, he/she traveled to Quito to study drawing with the maestro Antonio Salas. Two years later some of his poems were published in La Democracia. In 1862 he/she married Rosario Iturralde y Anda, which had thirteen children. He/She learned latin to read the lives of the Saints, and translated from the French and Italian.
He held several public positions: provincial treasurer of Ambato, Secretary of the Council of State, Manager of Ambato post, several times Deputy and Senator, Undersecretary of the Interior, Governor of Tungurahua and Minister of the Court of accounts of Ambato. Theoretical of Catholic principles, policy was staunch defender of García Moreno, so that following the assassination of the dictator he/she founded with the main collaborators of the regime the Republican Catholic society, to continue the garciana political line, which were called Garcianos and later conservative.
If policy can be described him indigenist, i.e., concerned at the situation of real Indian of his time, in literature was an indianist, because his writings shows the fascination that exercised the primitive life of indigenous people, upon becoming an Indian landscape of unquestionable merit. His main work is the Cumandá (1877). The central theme of the work is an Indian rebellion that started with the rise of 1790 and develops from 1808. The work has been valued by critics in a very different way: since accusing it of lacking elements fictional, to merit the author the title of literary genius. The truth is that Cumandá has the merit of having joined for the first time the novel indianist authentic American landscape. Other of his narrative works include: the Virgin of the Sun (1856), indigenous melodies (1858), an Ecuadorian village bride and groom (1872, trials of a novel published in the press of Guayaquil, but that it could not finish because it was a too strong of a priest of Ambato description) and Mazorra (1875, legend based on the life of Baltasar Carriedo and Maple)An inconvenient marriage (psychological novelita, 1893). In addition to Narrator, Mera developed an intense work as a diffuser of Ecuadorian culture values in works as historical-critical glance on the Ecuadorian poetry from its most remote times until our days (1868), geography of the Republic of Ecuador (1875) catechism, catechism explained from the policy of the Ecuador Constitution (1883) and our history referred to by the doctor don Pedro Fermín Cevallos (1869). He/She also published several brochures of disclosure of the Catholic religion - as devotional poetry and new month of María (1866), La ninth of the Inmaculada Concepción de María, am I Christian (1890)-, and numerous articles in various newspapers and magazines.
Other works are: the hero martyr (1876), Ode to the memory of García Moreno; The dictatorship and the restoration (work started towards 1884 but which never ended and that it was published in 1932). He/She also published selected works of the famous nun of Mexico, sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, preceded by biography and critical judgment on their productions (1872) and the collection of poems songs of the Ecuadorian people (1892). Member since 1862 the National Academy scientific and literary, created by García Moreno, is considered one of the most illustrious men of Ecuadorian literature.
