Destruction or Love is the first complete English translation of one of the major works by Spanish Nobel Laureate Vicente Aleixandre. It conveys to English readers some of the syntactic inventiveness and suggestive imagery of the original, which became a landmark of twentieth-century European literature. Illustrated.

Begun in 1939, barely four months after the close of the Spanish Civil War, these poems by the Nobel Laureate poet Vicente Aleixandre were written during a period of hardship and despair. In spite of his surroundings Aleixandre created the splendor of the shadow of a lost paradise that consisted of memory, nostalgia, yearning and illusion. This is the first full English version. The original Spanish text is included.

These include surrealism and the seminal role of Freud, narrative structure, genre, and lyric ancestors such as Fray Luis de Leon, Gustavo Adolfo Becquer, and Ruben Dario."--BOOK JACKET.