马丁·埃斯帕达

Martín Espada (born 1957) is a Puerto Rican-American poet, and a professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where he teaches poetry. Puerto Rico has frequently been featured as a theme in his poems.

Life and career

Espada was born in Brooklyn, New York. He was introduced to political activism at an early age by his father, Frank Espada, a leader in the Puerto Rican community and the civil rights movement. Espada received a B.A. in history from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and a J.D. from Northeastern University (Boston, Massachusetts). For many years, he worked as a tenant lawyer and a supervisor of a legal services program. In 1982, Espada published his first book of political poems, The Immigrant Iceboy's Bolero, featuring photography by his father. This was followed by Trumpets from the Islands of their Eviction (1987) and Rebellion is the Circle of a Lover's Hands. In 2001, he was named the first Poet Laureate of Northampton, Massachusetts. In 2018, Espada received the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, a lifetime achievement award given by the Poetry Foundation to a living U.S. poet that carries a $100,000 prize. Espada was the first Latino recipient of the honor.

About his first and subsequent visits to meet family in Puerto Rico, Espada said it was "absolutely transformative", an "absolute revelation", "a process of self-discovery", and that "going there affirms you have a history". His poem "Coca Cola and Coco Frio" is about that.

In 2009, Espada performed in The People Speak, a documentary feature film that uses dramatic and musical performances of the letters, diaries, and speeches of everyday Americans, based on historian Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States.

In 2021, Espada won the National Book Award for Poetry for his poem "Floaters" about two migrants, Oscar and his daughter Valeria, who drowned crossing the Rio Grande at the U.S. Border.

Espada is a professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and lives in Shelburne Falls, Massachusetts.

Awards and honours

Massachusetts Artists Foundation Fellowship in Poetry, 1984

National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellowship, 1986

PEN/Revson Foundation Fellowship in Poetry, 1989

Paterson Poetry Prize, 1991

National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellowship, 1992

Massachusetts Cultural Council Artist Grant, 1996

National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist, 1997

Before Columbus Foundation American Book Award, 1997

Gustavus Myers Center Outstanding Book Award, 1998

Pushcart Prize, 1999

Independent Publisher Book Award, 1999

Poet Laureate of Northampton, Massachusetts, 2001

Antonia Pantoja Award, 2003

American Library Association Notable Book, 2004

Robert Creeley Award, 2004

Charity Randall Citation, 2005

John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship, 2006

Pulitzer Prize Finalist, 2007

San Francisco Chronicle Best Books, 2007

Library Journal Best Poetry Books, 2007

Paterson Award for Sustained Literary Achievement, 2007

Premio Fronterizo, 2007

National Hispanic Cultural Center Literary Award, 2008

USA Simon Fellowship, 2010

Massachusetts Book Award, 2012

Milt Kessler Poetry Book Award, 2012

International Latino Book Award, 2012

Walt Whitman Birthplace Poet in Residence, 2012

Busboys and Poets Award, 2014

Academy of American Poets Fellowship, 2018

Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, 2018

National Book Award for Poetry, 2021

Works

Books of poetry

The Immigrant Iceboy's Bolero, Waterfront Press, 1982, ISBN 9780943862330

Trumpets from the Islands of Their Eviction, Bilingual Press, 1987, ISBN 9780916950729

Rebellion is the Circle of a Lover's Hands, Curbstone Press, 1990, ISBN 9780915306954

City of Coughing and Dead Radiators, W.W. Norton, 1993, ISBN 9780393312171

Imagine the Angels of Bread, Norton, 1996, ISBN 9780393039160

A Mayan Astronomer in Hell's Kitchen, Norton, 2000, ISBN 9780393048889

Alabanza: New and Selected Poems 1982-2002 (W.W. Norton, 2003 US, 2004 UK)

The Republic of Poetry. W.W. Norton. 2006. ISBN 9780393069709.

La República de la Poesía (Mago Editores, Chile, 2007)

Crucifixion in the Plaza de Armas, Smokestack Books, 2008, ISBN 9780955402814

La Tumba de Buenaventura Roig (Terranova Editores, Puerto Rico, 2008)

Soldados en el Jardín (El Gaviero Ediciones, Spain, 2009)

The Trouble Ball. W.W. Norton. 2011. ISBN 9780393080032. U.S.;, 2012, ISBN 9780393343564, UK

Vivas to Those Who Have Failed. W.W. Norton. 2016. ISBN 9780393249033.

Floaters : Poems, W.W.Norton, 2021, ISBN 9780393541038

Jailbreak of Sparrows: Poems, Knopf, 2025, ISBN 9780593537121

Books of essays

Zapata's Disciple (2nd ed.). Northwestern University Press. 2016. ISBN 9780810133853.

Zapata's Disciple. South End Press. 1998. ISBN 9780896085893. Martín Espada.

Auf der Suche nach La Revolución (Agentur Machtwort, Germany, 2004)

The Lover of a Subversive is Also a Subversive: Essays and Commentaries. University of Michigan Press. 2010. ISBN 9780472051472.

As editor

Poetry Like Bread: Poets of the Political Imagination (Curbstone, 1994)

El Coro: A Chorus of Latino and Latina Poetry. University of Massachusetts Press. 1997. ISBN 9781558491113. Martín Espada.

His Hands Were Gentle: Selected Lyrics of Víctor Jara (Smokestack, UK, 2012)

What Saves Us: Poems of Empathy and Outrage in the Age of Trump (Northwestern University Press, Curbstone, 2019)

In anthology

Ghost Fishing: An Eco-Justice Poetry Anthology, University of Georgia Press, 2018, ISBN 9780820353159

Seeds of Fire: Contemporary Poetry from the Other U. S. A. Smokestack Books. ISBN 978-0955402821