The 1949 recipient of Chile's National Prize in Literature, Pedro Prado played a foundational role in the artistic community of early-twentieth-century Santiago. Although lesser known than his compatriots Pablo Neruda, Gabriela Mistral, and Vicente Huidobro, Prado is credited with quietly laying the groundwork for a poetic revolution in Chile that later had a marked effect on these more internationally recognized poets. Prado's work introduced both free verse and prose poetry to Chile, paving the way for more extreme formal and thematic experimentation by later poets.

Pedro Prado was born on 8 October 1886 to Absalón Prado and Laura Calvo Mackenna in Santiago, Chile. The son of a doctor and an aristocratic mother, Prado benefited from his family's economic and social standing throughout his life, never depending upon work for economic survival. When Prado was merely two years old, however, his mother died from complications of a second pregnancy, and...