In the context of Spanish and Spanish American Modernismo, the Nicaraguan Rubén Darío is an author of major importance and a writer who has received much critical attention. Nonetheless, further research is yet to be done to deal comprehensively with Darío's life and works in the context of his importance and validity in twentieth-century Spanish and Spanish American literature. Critics have recognized Darío as one of the most representative and influential authors of his age, the poet who changed the course of Hispanic poetry and brought it into the mainstream of twentieth-century modernity. Enrique Anderson Imbert points out that his work divided Spanish American literary history into a "before" and an "after," and Octavio Paz suggests that many of the literary works written in the Spanish language since Darío have been influenced in some manner by his writings...