Ismaelillo

A seminal work in Latin America’s modernismo movement, this first anthology of verse by José Martí is available in a complete English translation for the first time. This accessible, annotated edition includes a critical introduction, presented in both English and Spanish, which explores the volume’s historical and literary contexts and addresses issues of the translation. Composed after domestic separation from his wife and infant son, and after his second exile from Cuba due to his involvement in the Guerra Chiquita, the 15 poems that comprise the collection demonstrate a poet-hero whose revolutionary spirit would ultimately lead to his participation—and subsequent death—in the conflict that freed Cuba from the Spanish yoke.