Even though I had a bit of trouble with the vocabulary, expressions and use of language, I found many of Marti’s stories pretty interesting. I usually tend to find it a bit annoying when authors are overly descriptive, but I found his choice of adjectives and the way he described things in his writing worked really well. I have a feeling it also helped a bit with my understanding of the story. I think the high level of description also worked because of his strong use of similes and metaphors throughout the short stories.

Knowing a bit about Marti through an awesome wikipedia article, I find that his life has a strong influence on his writing. I think his high use of descriptive adjective and his detailed narrative are in part to demonstrate what the outside world is like to his fellow Cubans. Many of his writings focus on describing the city, and I enjoyed his exploration on liberty. One of my favourite lines on that topic was at the beginning of Fiestas de la estatua de la libertad which opened with “Terrible es, libertad, hablar de ti para el que no te tiene”. I found that his search for liberty as a Cuban to be very interesting.