"The tree is happy because it is scarcely sentient; the hard rock is happier still, it feels nothing: there is no pain as great as being alive, no burden heavier than that of conscious life."

"The America of Moctezuma and Atahualpa, the aromatic America of Columbus, Catholic America, Spanish America, the America where noble Cuauhtémoc said: "I am not on a bed of roses" —our America, trembling with hurricanes, trembling with Love: O men with Saxon eyes and barbarous souls, our America lives. And dreams. And loves. And it is the daughter of the Sun. Be careful."

"In Nicaraguan history, the great modernist poet Rubén Darío is a strong figure, not just for literary people but for workers and farmers who possess a relatively low educational level. Attempting to trace the importance of poetry in the lives of Nicaraguans, one logically goes back to Darío...Most of those interviewed here speak of their links to Darío. His work is at the very roots of poetic experience in the country in much the same way that Whitman's Leaves of Grass shaped poetry in the United States."

"Rubén Darío, our national poet and cultural hero"

"I seek a form that my style cannot discover, a bud of thought that wants to be a rose."

"In Spanish, we have a tradition of open-ended, poetic stories. It's a very popular genre. Bequer, Lorca, Dario all wrote in this way. There are lots of writers who never wrote stories that had the knot-and-ending style. And they are considered great writers; they give a lot of pleasure."