This is an interesting portrait of child-poet turned international poetry star, but chronic alcoholic, Rubén Darío, a Nicaraguan poet during the turn of the century.
His first published poem comes at age 13, in a local newspaper, but he quickly rises to international acclaim. He flees Nicaragua for El Salvador, where the president takes him under his wing, and where his drinking issues begin to surface.
He's best known for initiating the Spanish-American literary movement known as modernismo (modernism) that flourished at the end of the 19th century.
This is a young adult book, but would be excellent to teach in an 11th or senior year high school course comparing Engle's poetry about Darío to Darío's own poetry.
The Gutenberg Project has several of his books available, such as Azul. And I found this excellent website showing a timeline of his poetry and world events to help put his literary impact into context.
