Remembering Federico García Lorca, 90 years since his assassination by Franco's fascists

August 18 marked 90 years since the murder of Federico García Lorca, the great Spanish poet and dramatist who was executed by Franco's fascist forces near Granada in 1936, during the first weeks of the Spanish Civil War.

Those who murdered Lorca may have believed that a bullet could silence his voice. History proved otherwise. His poetry, theatre and enduring humanism survived his killers, turning him into one of the most internationally recognised figures of Spanish literature and a lasting symbol of the democratic and anti-fascist Spain that Francoism sought to destroy.

 

Federico García Lorca: 82 years since his assassination by Franco's fascists

The 18th of August marked the 82nd anniversary of the assassination of the famous Spanish poet and dramatist Federico García Lorca, who was shot by dictator Franco's death squads in 1936. 

Back then, the fascists thought that they killed him; what they didn't know was that Lorca's legacy, through his extraordinary poetry, was immortal and would remain eternal as a universal symbol of democratic Spain. 

Through his poems, Lorca glorified the notions of love, as well as the one of death, he hated despotism and the exploitation of man by man. A conscious anti-fascist, he stood against any form of injustice. Although he never joined the organized revolutionary communist movement, he was a consistent and outspoken critic of the capitalist society. In his work he condemns Capitalism's results, including poverty, misery, alienation and racism.