"A wise, lonely novel . . . [and an] honest reflection of exile." —The New Yorker In the tradition of Roberto Bolaño's Savage Detectives, a celebrated classic and heart-wrenching story of a family torn apart by the forces of history, by one of Latin America's most celebrated writers The late Mario Benedetti’s work was often ranked with “such esteemed Latin American writers as Gabriel García Márquez, Carlos Fuentes and Julio Cortázar” (The Washington Post) and his novel The Truce has sold millions of copies around the world. His extraordinary novel Springtime in a Broken Mirror revolves around Santiago, a political prisoner in Uruguay, who was jailed after a brutal military coup that saw many of his comrades flee elsewhere. Santiago, feeling trapped, can do nothing but write letters to his family and try to stay sane. Far away, his nine-year-old daughter Beatrice wonders at the marvels of Buenos Aires, but her grandpa and mother—Santiago’s beautiful, careworn wife, Graciela—struggle to adjust to a life in exile. Published now for the first time in English, Springtime in a Broken Mirror tells with tenderness and fury of the indelible imprint politics leaves on individual lives. Generous and unflinching, it asks whether the broken bonds of family and history can ever truly be mended. Written by one of the masters of the Latin American novel, this is the story of a fractured continent, chronicled through the lives of a single family.

Despite its fascinating history, the attention paid by North American historians to Uruguay, a nation nestled in the corner of South America between Argentina and Brazil, is scant when compared to that shown to its neighbors.

"Reconstructs the experience of participatory urban governance in three impoverished communities in Montevideo, Uruguay. Offers an account of various experiences and explains successes and failures in reference to the distinct traditions and resources found in each community"--Provided by publisher.

Toward the end of his administration (2010-2015), then Uruguayan President Jose 'Pepe' Mujica made headlines across the world with a couple of unusual speeches at United Nations assemblies in Rio de Janeiro and New York that were heatedly anti-capitalist, anti-consumerist, anti-globalisation and anti-climate change all fuelled by a libertarian socialist concept of freedom. This Sancho Panza-like figure was not only one of the few presidents of developing countries not to have somehow got personally rich while in government, but was known to live modestly as a practicing farmer and gave away two-thirds of his salary to his left-wing political organisation and to social housing projects. Even more bizarre was the fact that he had become president of the country whose government he had tried to overthrow forty years earlier in a revolutionary guerrilla war, an exploit for which he spent over a decade in military jails after being shot, severely wounded and tortured. This book is an introduction to the politics and philosophy of an unrepentant permanent militant whose evolution took him from defeated guerrilla warrior to successful presidential candidate without inconsistencies or betrayals, whatever his adversaries from right and left may claim. The study sets Mujica not only in his Uruguayan and Latin American context but also within an International Left that is coming out of mourning for the loss of so-called existing socialism as they search for solutions to lessen the damage done by rampant neoliberal economics and to find creative alternatives. Stephen Gregory's polemic is essential reading for all those interested in discovering Uruguay's unique position in a Latin America where the political right is in decline and leftist governments are moving to the middle ground.