Andrés Bello

Andrés Bello , 1781-1865, South American intellectual leader, b. Venezuela. In 1810 he was sent with Bolívar on a mission to London, where he remained for 19 years as a diplomat, teacher, and writer. He reflected a new attitude in Hispanic-American letters, initiating the movement for intellectual independence from Europe. Called to a governmental post in Chile, he soon became a leader in Chilean education and reorganized the university at Santiago, becoming (1843) its rector. Many of his learned works, such as Gramática de la lengua castellana (1847) and Principios de derecho internacional (1844; revised from an earlier work), became textbooks, and he was author of a code of civil law for Chile. He wrote many poems in the neoclassical style.