Jorge Carrera Andrade (1902-1978) has been recognized in Latin America as one of the most important poets of the twentieth century. He was born in Quito, Ecuador, and was a diplomat as well as a poet, essayist and journalist, and he encountered many literary communities as he served appointments in Peru, France, Japan, and the United States. The originality of Carrera Andrade’s poetics is rooted in his experiences abroad as well as in the rich culture and natural landscapes of Ecuador. His distinguished literary career comprises a wide range of work, including editing, translation, criticism, and poetry.

He is a poet who remains difficult to categorize, though scholars and critics have drawn comparisons between his poetics and American imagism, Spanish ultraism, the Latin American Indigenous school, and the Japanese haiku form. William Carlos Williams described Carrera Andrade’s images as “so extraordinarily clear, so related to the primitive that I think I am seeing as an aborigine saw and sharing that lost view of the world. It's a sad pleasure but a great one.”