Cuban literature, like any other in Spanish America, is characterized by a tension between poetry and politics. The vast postcolonial writing of the past two centuries is a good example of this crossover of roles, so characteristic of Latin American intellectual history. In that story, the creation of literary works has been linked often to the founding of republics and the construction of national states. In the case of José María Heredia, José Martí, Nicolás Guillén, José Lezama Lima, Roberto Fernandez Retamar, and Heberto Padilla, this tension runs through their works, relevant to Spanish America, in poetry and prose. The aim of this course is to explore the political representation of the poetry of the six Cuban writers, including not only their most famous books of poetry, but some texts of chronicles and essays. (1 unit)

Required text: Electronic material provided at Middlebury.

This course is cross-listed with Literature.