Reviews of Espada's Works

“The Republic of Poetry is a dreamland, a utopia, a paradise of the imagination, where the local food is salutation and valediction, where the bloodstained plazas speak history, and where the law of the land is empathy. Martín Espada, like his spiritual forebear Pablo Neruda, names us all, in his every hard-fought line, to our citizenship in this nation of the great, indelibly American word.”
—Rafael Campo







“Espada means ‘sword’ in Spanish, and in these new poems Martín Espada wields the sword of his poetry like a veritable Zorro. The ghost of Allende rises, the ‘disappeared’ reappear, and the legacies of Neruda and Creeley say why they are not dead. Espada unites in these poems the fierce allegiances of Latin American poetry to freedom and glory with the democratic tradition of Whitman, and the result is a poetry of fire and passionate intelligence.”
—Samuel Hazo


With these new and selected poems, you can grasp how powerful a poet Martín Espada is: his range, his compassion, his astonishing images,his sense of history, his knowledge of the lives on the underbelly of cities, his bright anger, his tenderness, his humor. He commands all the levels of language from the colloquial to the high prophetic tone. He is a master of his craft and he has a great deal to say to us. Here is a major poet whose due is long overdue. —Marge Piercy

Context for "Jorge the Church Janitor Finally Quits"

In "Jorge the Church Janitor Finally Quits", Espada tells a story about a disgruntled janitor that is fed up with the discrimination he recieves while doing his underappreciated work for his church. Countless times throughout the poem, the janitor talks about how no one cares about the Latin American country he was from, or how to pronounce his name, which shows the extent of prejudice he puts up with from the fellow church goers. The irony of this poem, is that regarding his particular work location being a church, which one would think would be a place of acceptance, turns out to be a place of segregation and bigotry. Ultimately as the title of the poem states, the janitor quits, because he comes to the conclusion that the church goers viewed him simply as a device of the church that kept the grounds clean, making him appear to them, as no different than the "crazy squid" mop he used in achieveing their demands.

Framework for "Alabanza: In Praise of Local 100"

"for the 43 members of Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Local 100, working at the Windows on the World restaurant, who lost their lives in the attack on the World Trade Center"

The above is Espada's commentary over his work, and as one can see, Espada is basically paying homage to those worker's that lost their lives, by writing this piece, in addition to shedding light on the part of the 9/11 attacks that was not covered by the news media, because the sacrafices of the police and firefighters overshadowed these restaurant workers. Espada, also uses this piece, to advocate for the acknowledgment of latin immigrants not only as low-paid service workers, but as human beings that deserve to be treated as equals with dignity.

Link On Espada

On September 24th, 2002 Martin Espada was interviewed by Ilan Stavans, about how he viewed himself as a champion for the Puerto Rican Community and how Pablo Neruda and Walt Whitman were big influences on his poetry. Here are some excerpts from that interview. The full interview can be viewed here.


IS: Poetry and politics. In you and your work, the two converge. What does a poem do?

ME: A professor of mine, Herbert Hill, used to say that ideas have consequences. I really believe that. Poems communicate ideas in a variety of ways. One never knows what kind of impact the poem is going to have, who it's going to reach, what change it might engender. I don't put too many expectations on an individual poem. Eduardo Galeano has written that it’s madness or arrogance to think a work of art, by itself, can accomplish social change, but it would be equally foolish to think that a work of art can’t contribute to making that change. Personally, I see what I do as my small contribution.

IS: Your Puerto Ricanness is at the core of your identity and of the poetry that you've been writing since 1981 or '82 when your first book was published. And yet, you were not born in Puerto Rico, you were born in Brooklyn. How did the Puerto Rican-ness come to you, from the neighborhood, from the family, when you were a child?

ME: New York is the largest Puerto Rican city in the world. There are more Puerto Ricans in New York than in San Juan. I was surrounded by that from the beginning. My father, Frank Espada, was an activist, a leader in the Puerto Rican community of New York in the 1960's, and his role in the community was reflected everywhere around me. Later on he made a transition and worked as a documentary photographer, recording the life of the Puerto Rican community; again, that had a big impact on me. It was quite natural to develop and to nurture that identity, even though I was born in Brooklyn and not in San Juan.

IS: There is often among Latino writers a perceived sense of burden. As a so-called ethnic writer, one is destined to become the spokesperson for your people. You're destined to use political tools and infuse your work with that. You don't share this concept of burden. It is for you something all together different. It comes naturally. It comes from also the tradition in Latin America of the writer that represents the voiceless. Do you feel a constraint for Latino writers forced to represent, forced to speak out for others? What does that create in you?

ME: I don't feel that this is a burden. I don't feel that it's something I'm forced to do. It's a privilege. It's a responsibility, but also an honor. I have a subject. I have something to say. For me one of the great dilemmas of contemporary poetry in this country is that most poets don't have anything to say. They're writing poems instead of putting down new tile in the bathroom, or horseback riding, or tending the garden, or something else that could have been done just as easily. I feel blessed with a certain kind of gift, which is the gift of a tale to tell. There is a story. That's a gift. It's not a burden at all.

The Main Genre of Martin Espada

Though some may argue that Espada has several purposes behind writing his works, there is a recurrent goal underlying every piece. That goal, is Espada's endeavor to eradicate the injustice and prejudice that the Latin American Immigrants face in this country. To accomplish this goal, Espada writes his pieces, with similar themes dealing with the different types of prejudices and troubles that happen upon the Latin Immigrants as they experience their new lives here in America and strive for a status of equality among their neighbors.

Discussion Questions

Story Specific Questions

For "Alabanza: In Praise of Local 100"

1. How does Espada use sarcasm and imagery to illuminate the side of the 911 attacks that the media never covered?
2. Overall, how does Espada enlighten the reader of the poverty that the employees suffered and their dillegence to continue working despite their conditions.

For "Jorge the Church Janitor Finally Quits"

1. How does Espada employ literary skills like sarcasm and figurative imagery in this text, to create a mood of compassion and acceptance for the main working class protagonist in the poem.
2. What is significant about the first line of each stanza?
3. How does Jorge's work location, add to the irony of the poem?

Biography and Bibliography

Martin Espada called "the Latino poet of his generation" and "the Pablo Neruda of North American authors" by Sandra Cisneros, was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1957. Espada's collection, The Republic of Poetry, received the Paterson Award for Sustained Literary Achievement and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Sam Hamill called the collection, "truly pan-American, drawing on its many traditions and daring to insist upon its dreams of justice and mercy even during the age of perpetual war."

Espada's collection, Alabanza: New and Selected Poems, was published by Norton in 2003 and helped the author receive even more awards like the Robert Creeley Award and the Gustavus Myers Outstanding Book Award.

A former tenant lawyer, Espada is now a professor in the Department of English at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, where he teaches creative writing and the works of Pablo Neruda.

Books / Collections

Crucifixion in the Plaza de Armas (Smokestack, 2008)

Alabanza: New and Selected Poems (Norton, 2003)

Zapata’s Disciple (South End, 1998)

from martinespada.net