# Is "Desolación (Desolación: Poemas)" by Gabriela Mistral a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of Desolación (Desolación: Poemas) by Gabriela Mistral (Instituto de las Españas en los Estados Unidos, 1922) is identified by: The true first is the New York, 1922 printing bearing the imprint of the Instituto de las Españas en los Estados Unidos (Columbia University's Hispanic Institute), arranged for publication by Federico de Onís after his 1921 Columbia lecture on Mistral; the title-page/colophon names Carranza & Company, Inc. The true first edition is the Spanish-language Desolación, Instituto de las Españas en los Estados Unidos, New York, 1922 (printed by Carranza & Co.) — notable because Chile's national poet's first book appeared in New York rather than Santiago.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- The true first is the New York, 1922 printing bearing the imprint of the Instituto de las Españas en los Estados Unidos (Columbia University's Hispanic Institute), arranged for publication by Federico de Onís after his 1921 Columbia lecture on Mistral; the title-page/colophon names Carranza & Company, Inc. of New York as printer — a first-issue tell, since Mistral's debut book was issued in the United States, not Chile
- It is an octavo of 248 pages (with a publisher's list at the rear) opening with the "Palabras preliminares" signed by the Instituto de las Españas, and it gathers seven sections: five in verse — "Vida," "La Escuela," "Infantiles," "Dolor," and "Naturaleza" — plus two in prose, "Poemas en prosa" and "Cuentos." That contents arrangement is specific to the 1922 first: the 1923 Nascimento (Santiago) edition was enlarged and revised, so a differing or expanded table of contents signals a later edition, not the New York first
- Original binding is the least reliable point: dealer/library records disagree (some copies are described in full leather, others in boards/wrappers), and any full-leather copy may be a later private rebind, so binding is not decisive — confirm by the imprint and contents, not the cover
- Inscribed copies exist, as Mistral inscribed a number of early copies
- Publisher imprint reads Instituto de las Españas en los Estados Unidos
- Not a book-club edition (see below)

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Gabriela Mistral |
| Publisher | Instituto de las Españas en los Estados Unidos |
| Year | 1922 |
| True first | — |
| Format | Poetry |
| Key point | The true first is the New York, 1922 printing bearing the imprint of the Instituto de las Españas en los Estados Unidos (Columbia… |
| Book-club edition exists? | No |

## Points of issue
The true first is the New York, 1922 printing bearing the imprint of the Instituto de las Españas en los Estados Unidos (Columbia University's Hispanic Institute), arranged for publication by Federico de Onís after his 1921 Columbia lecture on Mistral; the title-page/colophon names Carranza & Company, Inc. of New York as printer — a first-issue tell, since Mistral's debut book was issued in the United States, not Chile. It is an octavo of 248 pages (with a publisher's list at the rear) opening with the "Palabras preliminares" signed by the Instituto de las Españas, and it gathers seven sections: five in verse — "Vida," "La Escuela," "Infantiles," "Dolor," and "Naturaleza" — plus two in prose, "Poemas en prosa" and "Cuentos." That contents arrangement is specific to the 1922 first: the 1923 Nascimento (Santiago) edition was enlarged and revised, so a differing or expanded table of contents signals a later edition, not the New York first. Original binding is the least reliable point: dealer/library records disagree (some copies are described in full leather, others in boards/wrappers), and any full-leather copy may be a later private rebind, so binding is not decisive — confirm by the imprint and contents, not the cover. Inscribed copies exist, as Mistral inscribed a number of early copies.

## Is this the true first?
The true first edition is the Spanish-language Desolación, Instituto de las Españas en los Estados Unidos, New York, 1922 (printed by Carranza & Co.) — notable because Chile's national poet's first book appeared in New York rather than Santiago. The first Chilean edition (Editorial Nascimento, Santiago, 1923) is an enlarged/revised, textually altered edition, not the first. The first English-language appearance in book form is Selected Poems of Gabriela Mistral, translated with an introduction by Langston Hughes (Indiana University Press, Bloomington, 1957) — commissioned in 1956 and issued the year of her death; Hughes stated no one had made a volume of Mistral's poems in English in the preceding thirty-odd years. It is frequently confused with the fuller bilingual Selected Poems of Gabriela Mistral translated and edited by her literary executor Doris Dana, with woodcuts by Antonio Frasconi (Johns Hopkins Press, Baltimore, 1971), which is later; Ursula K. Le Guin's Selected Poems of Gabriela Mistral (University of New Mexico Press, 2003) is later still.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
No significant book-club edition of Desolación exists in either Spanish or English — its collecting market is defined by the scarce 1922 New York first and the 1923 (and later) Nascimento Chilean editions, not club reprints. The trap here is not a book club but conflating editions: (1) mistaking the 1923 or a later Santiago (Nascimento) printing for the 1922 New York first; (2) treating the 2022 Columbia University Press centenary edition or modern Spanish reprints as early; and (3) assuming the 1971 Doris Dana bilingual Selected Poems is the first English rather than the 1957 Langston Hughes volume. Confirm the "Instituto de las Españas / New York / 1922" imprint (and Carranza & Co. printer) to secure the true first.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *Desolación (Desolación: Poemas)* by Gabriela Mistral a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/desolaci-n
CC BY 4.0. Part of the Canonical First-Edition Points of Issue dataset (https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/api/first-edition-titles.json). Last reviewed 2026-07-04.