Octavio Paz has long been acknowledged as Mexico's foremost writer and critic. In this international classic, Paz has written one of the most enduring and powerful works ever created on Mexico and its people, character, and culture. Compared to Ortega y Gasset's The Revolt of the Masses for its trenchant analysis, this collection contains his most famous work, The Labyrinth of Solitude, a beautifully written and deeply felt discourse on Mexico's quest for identity that gives us an unequaled look at the country hidden behind the mask. Also included are The Other Mexico, Return to the Labyrinth of Solitude, Mexico and the United States, and The Philanthropic Ogre, all of which develop the themes of the title essay and extend his penetrating commentary to the United States and Latin America.

El laberinto de la soledad contiene nueve ensayos que constituyen una profunda reflexi n de su autor sobre la naturaleza y constituci n del mexicano actual, concebido por Paz como el producto de un largo proceso de mestizaje, que le otorgan condiciones psicol gicas, morales, culturales e hist ricas particulares. As , analizando el sujeto en micro, Paz trata de abordar el macro del pueblo mexicano, como sujeto hist rico colectivo, con el nico objetivo de poder concebir una identidad nacional.

The Poems of Octavio Paz is the first retrospective collection of Paz's poetry to span his entire writing career from his first published poem, at age seventeen, to his magnificent last poem. This landmark bilingual edition contains many poems that have never been translated into English before, plus new translations based on Paz's final revisions. Assiduously edited by Eliot Weinberger--who has been translating Paz for over forty years--The Poems of Octavio Paz also includes translations by the poet-luminaries Elizabeth Bishop, Paul Blackburn, Denise Levertov, Muriel Rukeyser, and Charles Tomlinson. Readers will also find Weinberger's capsule biography of Paz, as well as notes on many poems in Paz's own words, taken from various interviews he gave throughout his long and singular life.

Octavio Paz has written one of the most enduring and powerful works ever created on Mexico and its people, character, and culture. Compared to Ortega y Gasset's The Revolt of the Masses for its trenchant analysis, this collection contains Octavio Paz' most famous work, The Labyrinth of Solitude, a beautifully written and deeply felt discourse on Mexico's quest for identity that gives us an unequaled look at the country hidden behind the mask. Also included are Postscript, Return to the Labyrinth of Solitude, and Mexico and the United States, all of which develop the themes of the title essay and extend his penetrating commentary to the United States and Latin America.

Una antología definitiva para adentrarse en el universo literario del mayor poeta mexicano contemporáneo: el premio Nobel de Literatura Octavio Paz.

Nueva edición conmemorativa de RAE y ASALE.

La vida de Octavio Paz corre en paralelo a la historia política y cultural del siglo XX. Su actividad literaria, diplomática y artística; su conocimiento de otras realidades externas a su país, y la relación con sus contemporáneos lo convierten en una figura esencial de la cultura en español. Esta antología propone un original itinerario cronológico por los escritos de Paz que entrelaza la prosa con la poesía, las cartas con los ensayos y otros escritos, hasta conformar una biografía vital y literaria del poeta a través de su obra.

El libro se completa con estudios de especialistas y de escritores, coetáneos del poeta y pertenecientes a generaciones posteriores, que ofrecen una visión amplia y rica de la creación del premio Nobel mexicano.

ENGLISH DESCRIPTION

The definitive anthology for immersing oneself in the literary universe of Mexico's greatest modern poet: winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature winner Octavio Paz.

New commemorative edition by RAE and ASALE.

Octavio Paz's life ran parallel to the political and cultural history of the twentieth century. His literary, diplomatic and artistic activity, his understanding of realities outside Mexico, and his relationships with his contemporaries make him an essential figure in Spanish-language culture. This anthology plots an original, chronological journey through his canon, blending poetry and prose, letters, essays and other writings that add up to create a dynamic and literary biography of the poet through his work.

Included are commentaries by experts on Paz's work as well as pieces by his peers and later writers, offering a rich overview of the legacy of Mexico's Nobel Prize-winning poet.

El Laberinto de la Soledad, escrito por Octavio Paz y publicado bajo el ISBN 9786074537987 por Sélector, S.A. de C.V., es una obra fundamental en la literatura mexicana y un profundo ensayo sobre la identidad y la cultura mexicana. En este libro, Octavio Paz, uno de los intelectuales más influyentes de México y premio Nobel de Literatura, explora la complejidad del carácter mexicano a través de un análisis de su historia, costumbres, y psicología social. Dividido en varios ensayos, El Laberinto de la Soledad examina cómo los mexicanos han desarrollado una identidad única que está profundamente marcada por su historia colonial, la Revolución Mexicana, y la influencia de la cultura española, indígena y mestiza. Paz reflexiona sobre conceptos como la soledad, el machismo, la muerte, y el sentimiento de inferioridad que, según él, permean la cultura mexicana y afectan la manera en que los mexicanos se ven a sí mismos y a su lugar en el mundo. El libro es conocido por su estilo lírico y filosófico, y por su capacidad para combinar análisis sociológico con poesía y reflexión personal. Es una obra que no solo busca entender al mexicano, sino también invitar al lector a cuestionar y reflexionar sobre su propia identidad y cultura. El Laberinto de la Soledad es ampliamente considerado como una obra esencial para comprender la psicología colectiva de México y es una lectura indispensable para cualquiera interesado en la historia, la cultura y la identidad mexicana. Este libro no solo ofrece un retrato íntimo y crítico del ser mexicano, sino que también plantea preguntas universales sobre la soledad, la identidad y la condición humana. Es una obra que sigue siendo relevante en la actualidad y que ha influido en generaciones de lectores y pensadores tanto dentro como fuera de México.

Presented in Eliot Weinberger's excellent new translation with the Spanish texts en face, this is the 1957 poem that definitively established Paz as a major international figure (Sagetrieb). Written as a single cyclical sentence (at the end of the poem the first six lines are written again), Sunstone is a tour de force of momentum. It takes as its structural basis the circular Aztec calendar, which measured the synodic period of the planet Venus (584 days--the number of lines of Sunstone). But, as The New Republic noted, this esoteric correlative design...does not circumscribe its subject. [It is] a lyrically discursive exploration of time and memory, of erotic love, or art and writing.

One of the most brilliant and original essayists in any language (Washington Post Book World) reflects on the six years he spent in India as Mexican ambassador-and reveals how the people and culture of that extraordinary land changed his life. Translated by Eliot Weinberger.

Nobel Laureate Octavio Paz is incontestably Latin America's foremost living poet. The Collected Poems of Octavio Paz is a landmark bilingual gathering of all the poetry he has published in book form since 1952, the year of his premier long poem, Sunstone (Piedra de Sol)--here translated anew by Eliot Weinberger--made its appearance. This is followed by the complete texts of Days and Occasions (Días Hábiles), Homage and Desecrations (Homenaje y Profanaciones), Salamander (Salamandra), Solo for Two Voices (Solo a Dos Voces), East Slope (Ladera Este), Toward the Beginning (Hacza el Comienzo), Blanco, Topoems (Topoemas), Return (Vuelta), A Draft of Shadows (Pasado en Claro), Airborn (Hijos del Aire), and Paz's most recent collection, A Tree Within (Árbol Adentro).

With additional translations by Elizabeth Bishop, Paul Blackburn, Lysander Kemp, Denise Levertov, John Frederick Nims, and Charles Tomlinson.

Aun cuando la redacci n material del libro se produjo entre marzo y abril de 1993, el prop sito de escribirlo data por lo menos de 1965, y en aquella poca el autor redact los primeros apuntes de lo que deseaba que, partiendo de la conexi n ntima entre los tres dominios --el sexo, el erotismo y el amor--, fuese una exploraci n del sentimiento amoroso . Resumiendo toda su trayectoria de vida, pensamiento y escritura, con una tensi n expresiva inabatible y una l cida y conmovida cercan a al n cleo m s ntimo y esencial de la existencia humana, Octavio Paz examina, compendia, hace revivir y otorga pleno sentido, desde sus or genes en la memoria hist rica y m tica hasta la experiencia cotidiana m s inmediata, a uno de los elementos fundamentales de la vida de hombres y mujeres: El fuego original y primordial, la sexualidad, levanta la llama roja del erotismo y sta, a su vez, sostiene y alza otra llama, azul y tr mula: la del amor. Erotismo y amor: la llama doble de la vida . El fuego original y primordial, la sexualidad, levanta la llama roja del erotismo y sta, a su vez, sostiene y alza otra llama, azul y tr mula: la del amor. Erotismo y amor: la llama doble de la vida .

Engrossing essays that reflect the author's vast and subtle knowledge of the world. Topics range from the religious rites of the Aztecs to modern american painting, from Eastern art and religion to love and eroticism. Translated by Helen Lane.

Configurations was his first major collection to be published in this country, and includes in their entirety Sun Stone (1957) and Blanco (1967). Paz himself translated many of the poems from the Spanish. Some distinguished contributors to this bilingual edition include, among others, Paul Blackburn, Lysander Kemp. Denise Levertov, and Muriel Rukeyser. Paz's poems, although rooted in the mythology of South America and his native Mexico, nevertheless have an international background, transfiguring the images of the contemporary world. Powerful, angry, erotic, they voice the desires and rage of a generation.

The renowned Mexican poet and critic Octavio Paz assembled this important anthology--the first of its kind in English translation--with a keen sense of what is both representative and universal in Mexican poetry. His informative introduction places the thirty-five selected poets within a literary and historical context that spans four centuries (1521-1910). This accomplished translation is the work of the young Samuel Beckett, just out of Trinity College, who had been awarded a grant by UNESCO to collaborate with Paz on the project.

Notable among the writers who appear in this anthology are Bernardo de Balbuena (1561-1627), a master of the baroque period who celebrated the exuberant atmosphere and wealth of the New World; Juan Ruíz de Alarcón (1581?-1639), who became one of Spain's great playwrights; and Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz (1651-1695), the beautiful nun whose passionate lyric poetry, written within her convent's walls, has made her, three hundred years later, a proto-feminist literary heroine.

This is a major collection of Mexican poetry from its beginnings until the modern period, compiled and translated by two giants of world literature.

Mexico's leading poet, essayist, and cultural critic writes of a Mexican poet of another time and another world, the world of seventeenth-century New Spain. His subject is Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, the most striking figure in all of Spanish-American colonial literature and one of the great poets of her age.

Her life reads like a novel. A spirited and precocious girl, one of six illegitimate children, is sent to live with relatives in the capital city. She becomes known for her beauty, wit, and amazing erudition, and is taken into the court as the Vicereine's protégée. For five years she enjoys the pleasures of life at court--then abruptly, at twenty, enters a convent for life. Yet, no recluse, she transforms the convent locutory into a literary and intellectual salon; she amasses an impressive library and collects scientific instruments, reads insatiably, composes poems, and corresponds with literati in Spain. To the consternation of the prelates of the Church, she persists in circulating her poems, redolent more of the court than the cloister. Her plays are performed, volumes of her poetry are published abroad, and her genius begins to be recognized throughout the Hispanic world. Suddenly she surrenders her books, forswears all literary pursuits, and signs in blood a renunciation of secular learning. The rest is silence. She dies two years later, at forty-six.

Octavio Paz has long been intrigued by the enigmas of Sor Juana's personality and career. Why did she become a nun? How could she renounce her lifelong passion for writing and learning? Such questions can be answered only in the context of the world in which she lived. Paz gives a masterly portrayal of the life and culture of New Spain and the political and ideological forces at work in that autocratic, theocratic, male-dominated society, in which the subjugation of women was absolute.

Just as Paz illuminates Sor Juana's life by placing it in its historical setting, so he situates her work in relation to the traditions that nurtured it. With critical authority he singles out the qualities that distinguish her work and mark her uniqueness as a poet. To Paz her writings, like her life, epitomize the struggle of the individual, and in particular the individual woman, for creative fulfillment and self-expression.

In The Bow and the Lyre Octavio Paz, one of the most important poets writing in Spanish, presents his sustained reflections on the poetic phenomenon and on the place of poetry in history and in our personal lives. It is written in the same prose style that distinguishes The Labyrinth of Solitude. The Bow and the Lyre will serve as an important complement to Paz's poetry.

Paz's discussions of the different aspects of the poetic phenomenon are not limited to Spanish and Spanish American literature. He is almost as apt to choose an example from Homer, Vergil, Blake, Whitman, Rimbaud as he is from Lope de Vega, Jiménez, Darío, Neruda. In writing these essays, he draws on his vast storehouse of knowledge, revealing a world outlook of ample proportions. In reading these essays, we share the observations of a searching, original, highly cultivated mind.

Octavio Paz launches a far-ranging excursion into the incestuous and tempestuous relations between modern poetry and the modern epoch. From the perspective of a Latin American poet, he explores the opposite meanings that the word modern has held for poets and philosophers, artists, and scientists. Tracing the beginnings of the modern poetry movement to the pre-Romantics, Paz outlines its course as a contradictory dialogue between the poetry of the Romance and Germanic languages. He discusses at length the unique character of Anglo-American modernism within the avant-garde movement, and especially vis-à-vis French and Spanish poetry. Finally he offers a critique of our era's attitude toward the concept of time, affirming that we are at the twilight of the idea of the future. He proposes that we are living at the end of the avant-garde, the end of that vision of the world and of art born with the first Romantics.

Octavio Paz, asserts Eliot Weinberger in his introduction to these Selected Poems, is among the last of the modernists who drew their own maps of the world. For Latin America's foremost living poet, his native Mexico has been the center of a global mandala, a cultural configuration that, in his life and work, he has traced to its furthest reaches: to Spain, as a young Marxist during the Civil War; to San Francisco and New York in the early 1940s; to Paris, as a surrealist, in the postwar years; to India and Japan in 1952, and to the East again as his country's ambassador to India from 1962 to 1968; and to various universities in the United States throughout the 1970s. A great synthesizer, the rich diversity of Paz's thought is shown here in all its astonishing complexity. Among the sixty-seven selections in this volume, a gathering in English of his most essential poems drawn from nearly fifty years' work, are Muriel Rukeyser's now classic version of Sun Stone and new translations by editor Weinberger of Blanco and Maithuna. And since for Paz, forever in motion, there can be no such thing as a definitive text, all the poems have been revised to conform to the poet's most recent changes in the original Spanish. Besides those by Rukeyser and Weinberger, the translations in the Selected Poems are by G. Aroul, Elizabeth Bishop, Paul Blackburn, Lysander Kemp, Denise Levertov, Mark Strand, Charles Tomlinson, William Carlos Williams, and Monique Fong Wust.

The speech delivered by Paz in acceptance of the 1990 Nobel Prize for Literature, in which he discusses gratitude, separateness, and modernity. Published in a handsome bilingual edition. Translated by Anthony Stanton.