One of the most familiar figures for Cubans is that of José Martí. Regarded as the national leader par excellence, his name is celebrated in institutions, monuments, places, decorations and so forth.

JOSÉ MARTÍ was smart enough to raise above the revolutionary conceptions that preceded him while at the same time, he was the most universal of the Cubans. At the end of the 19th century, Cuba and Puerto Rico were the last vestiges of what was before the vast Spanish colonial empire in the Americas. Martí felt the urgent need of releasing the islands as a former step of his major project: the true independence of the continet.

A Hero’s Biography José Julián Martí and Pérez was born in Havana, on Paula No. 41. His parents were Spaniards. Don Mariano Martí and Navarro, his father, a first sergeant of the Royal Corps of Artillery and Leonor Pérez Cabrera was his mother. Martí was greatly influenced in his early years of life by professor and patriot Rafael María de Mendive. The romantic nature of his professor and his decisive stand in favor of the Cuban independence strongly influenced Martí’s education. His political ideas appeared for the first time published in January 1869 in the underground newspapers of El diablo cojuelo and La patria libre. But the incipient freedom of speech was soon cut and he was sent to prison and to exile in 1869. But the incipient freedom of speech was soon cut and he was sent to prison and to exile in 1869, accused of being the instigator of disorders and leaving him as an orphan, deprived of ideology. This blow was worsened by his father’s rage who broke relations with him, a simple official at the service of the metropolis; however, he took it personally. After that, the boy was imprisoned on October 21, 1869, sentenced to six years of political prison for having written a letter regarded as subversive by the authorities. For a year he was condemned to hard labor at San Lázaro quays near the present Havana’s Malecón. The exaggerated sentence made him definitively a convinced revolutionary, though later was reduced, first to a brief confinement in El Abra farm in Isle of Pines (now the Isle of Youth) and then a deportation in Spain. Since he left Cuba, his life can be divided into three stages: from 1871 to 1884 he concluded his basic training; from 1884 to 1889, he matured intellectually and politically and from 1890 to 1895 he was fully dedicated to his homeland and to the conception of his ideas of freedom and fraternization of the American peoples. His stay in Spain where those who have been deported enjoyed full freedom of action and residence, was very important for Martí since he knew the revolutionary Madrid and concluded his studies. Also the proclamation of the Republic in February 1873 made him had many hopes that the new regime will grant the independence to Cuba. The last fifteen years of his life was mostly spent in the United States, where was engaged in organizing the struggle for the freedom of his homeland. This was a period of more political and literary intensity in Martí’s life. For a decade, he copiously wrote in different newspapers and magazines of the United States and Spanish-America. From 1887, he was consul of Uruguay in New York, and also of Argentina and Paraguay. Correspondent member of several academies and cultural societies and President of the Literary Spanish-American Society. The following step of his strategy was to set up a unifying body for the different groups that will take the revolutionary action until the last consequences. Thus he founded the Cuban Revolutionary Party in 1892 that was the efficient instrument to prepare what he used to call "the necessary war". Insurrection was about to appear in the scene and on February 24, 1895, the Island was raised in arms. However, Martí couldn’t see his dream come true and on May 19 of that same year, died fighting against a Spanish detachment in a place known as Dos Ríos near Bayamo.

Martí, the Man He was a passionate man in addition to a political fighter and an illustrious writer. In Mexico he had some love affairs with the actresses Rosario Peña and Concha Padilla, until he met the Cuban Carmen de Zayas Bazán, the descendent of a rich Cuban family that became his wife. After a short period of engagement, the couple married in 1877, settled in Guatemala, but life in common was a total failure for to balance their personalities was impossible. Carmen always wanted a family easy life in Cuba where she finally returned after reproaching his husband the scant time dedicated to his family for the pursuance of his ideas. They had a son, José Francisco. Nor even the reconciliation efforts made for this son were successful to save the lack of understanding that emerged between them and the marriage which definitively ended in 1890. At that time Martí has already approached another Cuban, Carmen Miyares, in whose boarding house he had lived for some time and whose daughters Martí regarded as his, especially the smaller one, María. Discover Today José Martí in Cuba He who visits Cuba will immediately observe that Martí’s figure is found all over the island: In Havana: José Martí’s House-Museum, on Leonor Pérez Nº 314. The most important and emotional articles that used to belong to the poet and revolutionary are on display. José Martí Memorial, situated at the foot of a star-shaped tower, raising 139 meters above the sea level . Near Plaza de la Punta and around the small fortified castle are the remains of the old colonial prison where an adolescent Martí was imprisoned. The Museo de la Ciudad (Museum of the City) also exhibits personal articles of the hero. Likewise his memory is kept in streets as Paseo Martí and in statues as those of the Central Park. In the Isle of Youth: El Abra farm located at just some kilometers from Nueva Gerona,. The place where José Martí was confined before his deportation to Spain. In Santiago de Cuba: In a magnificent mausoleum are the Apostle’s remains at Santa Ifigenia Cemetery in this city.

Martí Is Still Present José Martí was the organizer and the leader of the last American war waged against the classic European colonialism. Martí’s political ideas are still valid at present and has become a model since they have embodied the spirit of struggle of all those who have defended freedom, equity and man’s dignity.

Martí, the Writer of the Celebrated Short Poems

Another facet of this man that of being an excellent writer. He wrote on all the genres, from small dramas to novels upon request, but his poems were the ones that changed the route of poetry. His small book Short Poems, published in New York in 1891, is a collection of memories and anecdotes. Nevertheless, Martí’s political task filled his life. He did leave a copious amount of writings, among which are a large number of essays, chronicles, articles, speeches. His large capacity is evidenced in his daily activity. He was for fifteen years the chronicle of US dynamic life, of the ambitions of this country . He was a central figure in the halls of the Cuban rich people of New York’s Dreamer and passionate, Martí had a deep awareness of his changing times which demanded new forms and spirit to encourage what he called "Nuestra América".