Quote by Gabriela Mistral: “I know that sorrow is the deepest thing in creation.”

Suffering is not a surface emotion — it goes to the very root of what it means to be alive. For Mistral, grief and sorrow are not problems to be solved but fundamental to existence, as deep and real as anything in the world, and deserving of that recognition rather than avoidance.

Mistral published Desolación in 1922, the collection that made her an international literary figure. It was written in the aftermath of the suicide of her first love, Romelio Ureta, and the anguish of that loss permeates the entire collection. The title itself — Desolation — signals her conviction that grief is not incidental but central to human experience.

Chilean poet and diplomat, the first Latin American author to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature, awarded in 1945. Her poetry explored themes of love, loss, childhood, and maternal devotion, and she was a passionate advocate for education and children's rights across Latin America.