The Peruvian writer José Carlos Mariátegui (1895-1930) was one of the most influential political and social theorists of his country in his time. He exposed in intense, probing essays many of the problematic aspects of Peru's cultural, social, and economic life.

José Carlos Mariátegui was born on June 14, 1895, in Lima. As a child, he was introverted and meditative, owing in part to having been invalided for years by an injury which eventually resulted in the loss of a leg. During his young manhood he wavered between accepting life passively and aggressively imposing his nonconformist will on the world about him. This conflict was decided when Mariátegui, an avid reader of all types of writing, came across the work of the Spanish socialist Luis Araquistán.

Mariátegui was now stirred to witness socialism in action. He made a...