Xosé Luís Méndez Ferrín (Ourense, 7 August 1938) is a Galician writer and poet and is widely considered the highest representative of contemporary Galician literature. A doctor in philology, he studied philosophy at the University of Santiago de Compostela and Romanic philology at the University of Madrid.
He teaches literature at the Instituto Santa Irene in Vigo. He also writes for the daily newspaper Faro de Vigo and directs the quarterly political critic magazine A Trabe Ouro. Ferrín is a member of the Real Academia Galega (Galician Royal Academy). He was the president of that Academy from January 2010 until February 2013, when he resigned, accused of hiring relatives [1]. On 1 March 2013 he resigned his chair of academic [2]. He is Doctor Honoris Causa of the University of Vigo.
He was proposed to the Nobel Prize in literature by the Galician Writers Association in 1999. He has been awarded with the Galician Critics Prize, Spanish Critics Prize and National Critics Prize.
Ferrín maintains an active political activist life. Supporting political and social initiatives as Redes Escarlata. He is a member of the nationalist literary group Brais Pinto.