In 1920 Vallejos involvement in political matters concerning Indians led to his

imprisonment for nearly three months. This experience heightened his feeling of
loss at the death of his mother and contributed to a state of depression that was to
torment him the rest of his life. Escalas melografiadas (1922; Musical Scales), a
collection of short stories, and many of the more complex poems of Trilce (1922;
Eng. trans. Trilce) were conceived during his imprisonment. In his major work Trilce,
Vallejo signaled his complete break with tradition by incorporating
neologisms, colloquialisms, typographic innovations, and startling imagery, with
which he sought to express the disparity that he felt existed between
human aspirationsand the limitations imposed on people by biological existence and
social organization.
After publishing Fabula salvaje (1923; Savage Story), a short psychological
novel about the decline of a mentally disturbed Indian, Vallejo left for Paris and
never returned to his native land. Life in Paris was difficult for him; he barely made
a living from translations, language tutoring, and political writing. But while he felt
like an outsider because of his Indian heritage, he succeeded in establishing
contacts with leading avant-garde artists. He kept in touch with Peru by publishing
articles in Amauta, the journal founded by his friend Jos Carlos Maritegui, founder
of the Peruvian Communist Party.
BRITANNICA STORIES

Vallejo came to believe that the language of poetry should be devoid of all traditional
devices in its description of the human condition, and that literature should also
serve the cause of the masses. Marxism seemed to him to be the only way of
rectifying the abuses and injustices he saw in society, and two visits to Russia in
1928 and 1929 served to reinforce his political commitment. He joined the
Communist Party in 1931.
Vallejo was expelled from Paris in 1930 as a political militant and went to Madrid.
There he wrote the proletarian novel El tungsteno (1931; Tungsten), showing the
brutal exploitation and degradation of Indian workers at a Peruvian tungsten mine.
He returned to Paris in 1932, and he then spent two years in Spain during that
nations civil war (193639). The Spanish Civil War inspired most of his last
important volume of poetry, Poemas humanos (1939; Human Poems), which
presents an apocalyptic vision of an industrial society in crisis and unable to
advance beyond a state of mass evil, alienation, and despair.
Most of the poems of the 1930s were published only after Vallejos death.
His fiction is collected in Novelas y cuentos completos (1970; Complete Novels
and Stories) and his poetry in Obra potica completa (1974; Complete Poetical
Works). The Complete Posthumous Poetry (1978) is an English translation by
Clayton Eshleman and Jos Rubia Barcia.