Platero and I / Selected Poems

Juan Ramon Jimenez received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1956 for his luminous contributions to Spanish poetry, of which Platero and I remains the most beloved and widely read work. This lyrical prose poem, recounting the wanderings of a poet and his silver donkey through the Andalusian countryside, achieves a rare synthesis of simplicity and profundity. Jimenez's pursuit of "pure poetry" profoundly shaped the Generation of '27, influencing such major figures as Federico Garcia Lorca and Rafael Alberti.

Jimenez composed his finest work during the years leading up to the Spanish Civil War, a period of extraordinary literary ferment in Spain. After Francisco Franco's victory, Jimenez was forced into exile, joining the vast diaspora of Spanish intellectuals and artists who carried their country's cultural heritage into the wider world.