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I share the humanitarian sentiments of Lawrence E. Prescott, author of the recently published Without Hatreds or Fears: Jorge Artel and the Struggle for Black Literary Expression in Colombia, who, in the acknowledgement section of this volume, wrote that "my original intention was to complete and publish a study on the poetry of Jorge Artel during his lifetime" (p. 9). "Regrettably", to use Prescott's exact word, Artel died in 1994 and never will have the opportunity to read and appreciate this timely volume dedicated to his life and works. I think that Artel would be exceptionally swollen with pride to see his poetic trajectory immortalized in such a comprehensive and thorough manner. Significantly, the cover of the book dons a photograph (from the 1930's) of a young, relaxed-- looking, poetically flirtatious Jorge Artel which seems to say to the potential reader "welcome to my world, without hatreds or fears". It should be noted here that the phrase "without hatreds or fears" comes directly from the title of one of Jorge Artel's poems titled "Poema sin odios ni temores", first published in 1955.
For the reader who is unaware of Jorge Artel's bio-bibliographical data, he is described in Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African American Experiences (Appiah & Gates, Jr., eds., Basic Civitas Books, 1999) in the following manner: "born April 27, 1909, Cartagena de Indias, Colombia; died August 19, 1994, Barranquilla, Colombia), Afro-Colombian poet, lawyer, journalist and diplomat; Artel, whose real name was Agapito de...