Galician Books

• The latinization of Galicia
• Mediaeval splendour
• Rexurdimento
• The turn of the century
• The post-war recovery
• Present-day literature

History of our letters

Galicia has had its own language and culture for more than a thousand years. Our literature is, on its own right, one of the European traditions, sustained by a long history which has given it a distinctly native personality. In the present day, writing in Galician entails understanding the signification of this legacy and helping to keep it vital and, at the same time, to perpetuate its evolution.

The earliest preserved written example of Galician dates back to the 13th century. The first steps of our literature were, at any rate, decidedly firm: for more than two centuries, Galician-Portuguese was the official language of poetry in the whole Iberian Peninsula.

Since that time, our literature has gone through both bright and dark moments. When, in the second half of the 19th century, the first efforts for the structuring of Galicia's own identity began, our letters gained a crucial momentum. That has made it possible for Galician literature to be nowadays the driving force of a solid and permanently evolving publishing industry.