José Martí: A Revolutionary Life

by Alfred J. López

"The one and only book that treats the nineteenth-century Cuban figure Jos� Mart� as a human instead of an idol, an apostle, or an unblemished personality." --Tom Miller, author of Revenge of the Saguaro

Jos� Mart� (1853-1895) was the founding hero of Cuban independence. In all of modern Latin American history, arguably only the "Great Liberator" Sim�n Bol�var rivals Mart� in stature and legacy. Today he is revered by both the Castro regime and the Cuban exile community, whose shared veneration of the "apostle" of freedom has led to his virtual apotheosis as a national saint.

In Jos� Mart� A Revolutionary Life, Alfred J. L�pez presents the definitive biography of the Cuban patriot and martyr. Writing from a nonpartisan perspective and drawing on years of research using original Cuban and U.S. sources, including materials never before used in a Mart� biography, L�pez strips away generations of mythmaking and portrays Mart� as Cuba's greatest founding father and one of Latin America's literary and political giants, without suppressing his public missteps and personal flaws. In a lively account that engrosses like a novel, L�pez traces the full arc of Mart�'s eventful life, from his childhood and adolescence in Cuba, to his first exile and subsequent life in Spain, Mexico City, and Guatemala, through his mature revolutionary period in New York City and much-mythologized death in Cuba on the battlefield at Dos R�os. The first major biography of Mart� in over half a century and the first ever in English, Jos� Mart� is the most substantial examination of Mart�'s life and work ever published.

"The life, the history and the facts are all here in L�pez's volume." --The Washington Post

Genres: History, Biography, Nonfiction

432 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 1, 2014

About the author

Born in New York City to Cuban parents and raised in Miami, Alfred J. López is Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Purdue University. López was the founding editor of The Global South, a leading globalization studies journal, and his work has also appeared in top journals such as American Literature, Comparative Literature, and South Atlantic Quarterly, among many others.

Reviews

[Rose · Rating 4 out of 5]

Detailed but lively biography of the Cuban hero who spent much of his life in exile. A few well-chosen illustrations.

[Barefoot Danger · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great biography that traces not only the personal but also the political and intellectual development of Marti. Can get dry and slow at times, but overall extremely well-written.

[Jim Folsom · Rating 3 out of 5]

Too long, needed a good Editors pen.