César Vallejo

My will veers between the point at which one is reduced to the sole desire for death and the intention of conquering the world by sword and fire.

It's the birthday of poet César Vallejo (books by this author), born in Santiago de Chuco, Peru (1892). As a young man, he worked as a miner and then as a cashier at a sugar plantation that employed slave laborers. He was horrified by the exploitation of poor workers, and he later became a socialist.