This article defines the magazine Martín Fierro using criticism sent to Roberto Mariani in this publication; it was published by this same journal under the title “Martín Fierro y yo” [Martín Fierro and I]. His text emphasized four aspects of the magazine: Martín Fierro’s centrist political character and the lack of a vehicle that would express the extreme left’s views, with which Mariani himself identified. [He also touched on] the admiration that Martín Fierro showed toward the figure of Leopoldo Lugones, whom Mariani considered to be a fascist. He also mentions that Martín Fierro had taken its name from the poem of José Hernández, when the latter was considered to be the symbol par excellence of “Criollismo,” even while the same magazine—in Mariani’s opinion—displayed a more European cultural character. Moreover, in relation to this last point, there was Martín Fierro’s lack of sensitivity to the local scene, which was evidenced by its support of writers such as Paul Morand (French) and Ramón Gómez de la Serna (Spanish). 

Martín Fierro (1924-27) occupied a prominent place among the great proliferation of magazines that covered the avant-garde in Argentina, and even more so in Buenos Aires; it was published during the 1920s. Evar Méndez (1888-1955) served as its director, although in 1925 Oliverio Girondo (1891-1967), Eduardo J. Bullrich, Sergio Piñero and Alberto Prebisch (1899-1970) also participated in the editing of the magazine. Great Argentine writers collaborated on the magazine, including Girondo, Ricardo Molinari, Leopoldo Marechal (1900-70) and Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986), among others; and artists such as Emilio Pettoruti, Xul Solar and Norah Borges. Martín Fierro shut down during the Hipólito Yrigoyen’s candidacy for the national presidency when its group members became divided between those who wanted to introduce politics into the magazine and those who did not. This internal debate led to the magazine’s closing. It is important to emphasize the fact that the magazine’s contemporaries regarded Martín Fierro as the representative of the avant-garde in Argentina.  In issue number 7, dated July 25, 1924, Martín Fierro published Mariani’s text “Martín Fierro y yo” [Martin Fierro and I], which touched off the Boedo-Florida controversy that encompassed the two most prominent literary trends in Buenos Aires during the 1920s. In 1927 another article titled “La extrema izquierda” was published in the book, Exposición de la Actual Poesía Argentina [Exposition on Current Argentine Poetry], wherein Mariani formulates the dichotomy between the two literary trends with greater precision. Around 1924 two literary groups began to form based on different neighborhoods or zones in the city of Buenos Aires. One of these, the workers’ zone of Boedo, served to identify the writers of the left, the majority of whom were associated with Editorial Claridad, a publishing house that sought to disseminate authors with a political and social commitment. Calle Florida, on the other hand, was considered the most elegant zone of the city because of its art galleries, photography studios, opulent shops and bakeries; it became identified with those writers who were advocating an aesthetic change in line with the proposals of the avant-garde as well as a renewal of the arts and literature. This division and opposition between Florida and Boedo served to define proposals on both ideological and aesthetic levels. 

Roberto Mariani (1892-1946), as a member of the Boedo group, along with other figures such as Álvaro Yunque and Elías Castelnuovo, advocated literature with a humanitarian sentiment, which would be tied to a social and political commitment.