Spanish Image of Death (Masterplots II: Poetry, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Cesar Vallejo
- First Published: 1939
- Type of Work: Lyric
- Genres: Poetry, Lyric poetry
The Poem
In his “Spanish Image of Death,” César Vallejo issues an unusual command: the command to call Death, the alien figure whose personification functions as the central metaphor of the poem. While it may be understood in one reading as a poem lamenting the horrors of war, more broadly the poem confronts a question that preoccupied Vallejo throughout his poetry: the question of the role of the poet. The battle against Death in the poem, then, becomes the battle of human passion—spearheaded by the poet—against extinction.
Death is foremost, as the title makes...
[The entire page is 1524 words long]
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