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Cover of María

María

by Jorge Isaacs · 1867

Romance · Historical Fiction · Classics

A Premium book: the first chapter is free to read, the rest comes with Premium.

Efraín grows up on a family hacienda in Colombia's Cauca valley, where he falls in love with María, a girl raised in the household. Her fragile health and his years away at school threaten their happiness. One of the most loved novels of Latin America.

Content note: Written in 1867, the novel shows slavery on the estate and the attitudes of its time. The ending is sad.

60 chapters

A look inside

It is a part of the faithfulness of Isaac’s transcript of life in provincial Colombia that he uses many words which are Cauca localisms. Several of these have been left untranslated, as having no equivalent, either as word or thing, in English⁠—or, indeed, in Spanish. It is always sufficiently clear from the context, however, that they are names of animals, often onomatopoetic, or of plants; and nothing more could be conveyed by a roundabout translation. Special acknowledgments are due Señor Carlos Martinez Silva LL.D., delegate from the republic of Colombia to the Pan-American Congress, for valuable aid kindly rendered the translator.

R. O.

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