Jaime Gil de Biedma was one of Spain's most highly respected poets, though his work is not very well known outside his own country. A member of the Generation of the 1950s, he began writing vehement poetry of social criticism in the late 1950s in the style of the first so-called social poets, such as Blas de Otero, Gabriel Celaya, and José Hierro. He later became disillusioned with the possibilities of poetry as a tool for social change and began to take an ironic stance in his work to express the disillusionment that most of the writers of his generation shared. Like his contemporaries, Gil de Biedma became more conscious of style and started experimenting with less prosaic poetic forms. Nevertheless, he differs from his group because of his educational background and experience. His knowledge of French and English and his analysis of diverse critical theories have...