José Eustasio Rivera Salas (February 19, 1888 – December 1, 1928) was a Colombian lawyer and writer famous for his important book The Vortex.
Early life
José Eustasio Rivera was born on February 19, 1888, in Aguas Calientes, a small village near the city of Neiva. Later that year, the village became part of a new town called San Mateo, which was later renamed Rivera to honor José Eustasio. His parents were Eustasio Rivera Escobar and Catalina Salas. He was the first son and fifth child among eleven siblings, with eight of them living to adulthood: José Eustasio, Luis Enrique, Margarita, Virginia, Laura, Susana, Julia, and Ernestina.
Despite his family’s financial challenges, José received a Catholic education with help from relatives and his own hard work. He attended Santa Librada school in Neiva and later San Luis Gonzaga in Elías. In 1906, he received a scholarship to study at a teacher training school in Bogotá. In 1909, after completing his studies, he moved to Ibagué, where he worked as a school inspector. In 1912, he enrolled at the Law and Political Science Faculty at the National University and graduated as a lawyer in 1917.
Career
After failing to be elected to the senate, he was appointed Legal Secretary of the Colombo-Venezuelan Border Commission to set the borders with Venezuela. There, he traveled through the Colombian jungles, rivers, and mountains, gaining direct experience with the places and people that would later inspire his writing. He was unhappy with the lack of support from his government for his trip and left the commission. Later, he returned to the commission but first traveled to Brazil, where he met important Brazilian writers of his time, including Euclides da Cunha. During this time, he learned about life in the Colombian plains and the challenges of rubber extraction in the Amazon jungle, topics that became central to his major work, La vorágine (1924), now considered one of the most important novels in Latin American literary history. To write this novel, he studied extensively about the conditions of rubber workers in the Amazon basin.
After the success of his novel, he was elected in 1925 to the Investigative Commission for Exterior Relations and Colonization. He also wrote several articles for Colombian newspapers. In these writings, he pointed out problems with government contracts, described the lack of attention given to Colombia’s rubber areas, and highlighted the poor treatment of workers. He also defended his novel, which some Colombian critics had called too poetic. However, this criticism was largely ignored because the novel received widespread praise from readers and critics around the world.
Death
Rivera arrived in New York during the last week of April 1928 with the goal of translating his novel into English, publishing it in the United States, and turning it into a motion picture film to share Colombian culture with people around the world. Although his efforts faced many challenges, progress was being made when Rivera had a seizure on November 27 and was taken to Stuyvesant Polyclinic Hospital. He remained unconscious for four days and passed away on December 1, 1928.
After his death, Rivera’s body was sent by ship from New York to Barranquilla aboard the United Fruit Company’s ship, the Sixaola. Upon arrival, his body was carried in a procession to the Pro-Cathedral of Saint Nicholas of Tolentino, where a requiem mass was held, and his body was placed in a chapel for public viewing. The casket was then transported down the Magdalena River to Bogotá on the steamship Carbonell González, arriving in Girardot. From there, the body was moved by train to Bogotá, arriving on January 7, 1929, and placed in the Capitolio Nacional for public viewing. Finally, Rivera’s body was buried in the Central Cemetery of Bogotá on January 19, 1929.