Rosalía de Castro was born on February 24, 1837 in a house located to the right of the Camino Nuevo, the old way of entering Compostela for travelers coming from Pontevedra. She was baptized the girl, a few hours later as the daughter of unknown parents. In elementary school she already showed an aptitude for verse. In 1854 she played the main role in the drama Rosmunda, by Gil and Zárate, at the Liceo de la Juventud; and in 1860, already married, she participated in a dramatic performance for the benefit of those wounded in the African campaign, also in Santiago.
Rosalía de Castro married Manuel Martínez Murgía on October 10, 1858, in the parish church of San Ildefonso. The following year Rosalía gave birth to her first daughter, Alejandra, and had six more children. The domicile of the couple changed many times. They lived in Madrid and Simancas, where she wrote most of the compositions for Follas novas.
The writer never enjoyed good health. She lived consecrated to the home, to her children and her husband, without aspiring to any glory, fully secluded in private life, and it was he who convinced her to publish her works. She died of cancer on July 15, 1885.
With Cantares gallegos she positioned herself as a forerunner, together with Curros Enríquez and Pondal, of the cultural Rexurdimento of Galicia. Her masterpiece in Spanish is En las Orillas del Sar, verses with an intimate tone, strange penetration, charged with nocturnal beauty. She deserves to be considered, along with Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer, as the forerunner of modernity and initiator of a new Castilian metric.