Background
Manuel was born on February 28, 1871, in Caracas, Distrito Federal, Venezuela.
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1898
Manuel was born on February 28, 1871, in Caracas, Distrito Federal, Venezuela.
The son of wealthy farmers, Diaz Rodriguez studied medicine in Caracas, Venezuela, and the European cities of Paris, France, and Vienna, Austria as well as in Italy.
In the mid-1890s, Manuel began contributing pieces to El cojo ilustrado and Cosmopolis, Venezuelan periodicals dedicated to modern writing. In Sermones liricos (“Lyric Sermons”), Diaz Rodriguez relates how he became an author. While dining with a friend, the author criticized a travel book and proclaimed that he could write a better work. After his friend challenged him, Diaz Rodriguez decided to write such a book. Following his first trip to Europe, Diaz Rodriguez wrote Sensaciones de viaje (“Travel Impressions”), a collection of essays about his travels. This book so impressed the literary community in Venezuela that the Academia de la Lengua (Academy of Language) presented him with an award. This warm reception inspired Diaz Rodriguez to write another book of travel essays, De mis romerias (“From My Pilgrimages”).
The turn of the twentieth century was an important period for Diaz Rodriguez. In 1899, General Cipriano Castro spearheaded a revolution and established a dishonest and violent government in Venezuela. Honeymooning in Paris with Graziela at the time, Diaz Rodriguez responded to the political upheaval with three novels: Sangre patricia (“Patrician Blood”), Peregrina, o el pozo encantado (“Peregrina, or, the Enchanted Well”), and the autobiographical novel Idolos rotos.
In 1908, General Juan Vicente Gomez, another brutal dictator deposed General Cipriano Castro for control of Venezuela. During the Gomez regime, Diaz Rodriguez held a number of political posts in Venezuela and abroad. He also gave speeches and continued to write essays during this time. Manuel died in 1927.
Venezuela’s literary modernism movement differs markedly from the modernism of its Latin American neighbors. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the positivist movement in philosophy and literature stressed the importance of science over theology and metaphysics. Followers of positivism often disagreed with people who backed modernist philosophy and literature, as modernism tried to reconcile theology with science. While Latin American modernists in other countries shunned the positivist perspective, Venezuelan modernists such as Diaz Rodriguez embraced positivism. Critics have speculated that the author’s background in medicine and extensive reading may have contributed to these views.
Manuel Díaz Rodríguez, was member of the National Academy of History from 1926.
Quotes from others about the person
"Diaz Rodriguez uses the themes of 'alienation and escapism' as 'an aesthetic device for reflecting a reality seen as lacking and empty.'” - Hugo Achugar
Diaz married Graziela Calcano on July 7, 1899.
