The Canto General, thought by many of Neruda’s most prominent critics to be the poet’s masterpiece, is the stunning epic of an entire continent and its people.

Jack Scmitt is Professor Emeritus of Spanish and Portuguese at California State University, Long Beach. Roberto González Echevarría is Sterling Professor of Hispanic and Comparative Literatures at Yale University and a member of the American Academy of Arts of Sciences.

“The confidence and richness of this work reflect the richness of the poet’s life. . . . Written when Neruda was in his 40s, Canto General stands at the center of the poet’s life and work. Jack Schmitt’s translation . . . gives us Neruda at his most Adamic and most overtly political. . . . Schmitt has produced a consistent, readable version of the entire Canto General, and this is a major achievement.”—The Nation

“A fluent and readable translation.”—Times Literary Supplement

“The appearance of the first complete English translation in America of Pablo Neruda’s great epic Canto General should be seen as one of the most important events in twentieth-century American literature.”—Bloomsbury Review

ALTA Outstanding Translation of the Year, The American Literary Translators Association