No one has mentioned García Lorca? Certainly the most important in the 20th century in Spain. He also profoundly influenced the young Neruda. And Rubén Darío. He was from Nicaragua but influenced the entire Spanish language, and was even recognized in France as an important poet. Other than a few nationalists, in terms of literature, most people see all literature in Spanish as a single literature, not divided as “Castillian”, “Latin American” and so on.
http://www.ciudadfutura.com/lorca/html/poemas.html
http://www.dariana.com/
The language is really the thing that unites the Hispanic world. Argentines and Chileans may not always get along very well, but they recognize Neruda and Borges respectively. Even though most of the writers such as Garcia Lorca, Neruda, and Benedetti were/are “leftist” or “Marxist” in their politics, people on the “right” politically recognize them as great poets and often even quote them.
My favorite poet in Spanish is Mario Benedetti (Uruguayan). He is also famous for prose, as was Quiroga. It’s not a poem but I would recommend his “La Tregua”.
http://personales.jet.es/isildur/
One of the most interesting poets, and great women poets, was a Mexican nun named Sor Juana Inés De La Cruz, who lived in the 17th century colony of New Spain.
http://www.uni-mainz.de/~lustig/texte/antologia/sorjuana.htm
The Castillian/Spanish debate is a complex one. In English most people use the word Castillian to refer to the Spanish of Spain as opposed to Latin America. But even in Spain there are different dialects of “Spanish”. The Andaluz dialect in the South is closer to many American dialects for instance, such as Cuban, Chilean, or Venezuelan, than it is to Madrileño.
In Spain I think they now use castellano as the name for “Spanish” to emphasize that a person can speak Catalan, Gallician, or Basque - and still be a Spaniard (un español). I believe in Franco’s rule the language was called español instead, to make his point that Spain had only one national language.
I wonder where the Argentine (and Uruguayan) use of vos comes from (Catalan?), but I guess that’s another question.
