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33 part ii Foundational Narratives Chapter 3 José Martí and His Legacy La idea de la persona redentora es de otro mundo y edades, no de un pueblo crítico y complejo. [The idea of the redeemer belongs to another world and to other eras, not to a critical and complex people.] —José Martí I n contemplating the life and work of José Martí, one is likely to be overcome by a feeling of awe. Born in 1853 in Havana of Spanish parents, at a time when Cuba was one of the last remaining Spanish colonial possessions in the New World, Martí was drawn at a young age into a circle of Cuban intellectuals who favored independence for their island. At age sixteen, he was accused of conspiring against the Spanish colonial authorities and sentenced to six years of hard labor. After six harrowing months working in a stone quarry, Martí was granted clemency and deported to Spain. He studied at the University of Zaragoza and began building a literary career, publishing among other things a powerful account of his time as a political prisoner in Cuba, entitled El presidio político en Cuba [Political prison in Cuba] (1871). Except for two brief visits to Cuba in 1877 and 1878, and his final return to the island in 1895, Martí spent the rest of his life in exile. He lived in various Latin American countries—Mexico, Guatemala, and Venezuela—but spent most of his time in New York City, where he resided from 1880 to 1895. During these years, Martí emerged as a leader of the Cuban struggle for independence, distinguishing himself as an efficient political and military organizer and as a compelling intellectual spokesman for the cause. Martí also produced a vast body of writings, mostly journalistic, dealing with an astonishing range of topics. His innumerable chronicles reporting for Latin American publications on the U.S. scene are widely regarded as among the most probing, powerful readings of American culture and society ever produced by a foreign observer. At the same time, Martí edited newspapers, created ...

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