Category: en inglés

Neruda – Second Cycle of His Poetic Work

Moving away from his introspective beginnings, the second cycle of Neruda’s poetry was more oriented towards a deep social consciousness. By the mid-1920s, Chilean society had changed remarkably, affecting the way the poet perceived the world in which he lived, as he later acknowledged in his memoirs. Neruda was then aware of the return of thousands of now unemployed workers from salty deserts to the capital, of the fight led by Luis Emilio Recabarren, of the popular and student demands, as well as the unshakeable reign of the oligarchy. Without wanting to erase all traces of love, life, joy or sadness from his poems, Neruda nevertheless recognized that it was “impossible to completely reject the street and leave no place for it in my poems.” (Confieso that he vivido, 1979, 76). In addition to these social circumstances, the introduction of politics into his life and work was also motivated by his first diplomatic career started in 1927, when he was appointed consul of Chile in Burma. This is what allowed him to get in touch with the world and to focus on social justice. In 1927, he published in Spain a book written during his travels through the East and Europe, which eventually became one of his major works: Residence on Earth.

Pablo Neruda’s literary and poetic creativity has earned him the recognition of his peers and critics. In 1965, he received the title of Doctor Honoris Causa at Oxford University. In 1945, he received the National Prize for Literature and, in 1971, the Nobel Prize for Literature, becoming the sixth Spanish-speaking writer and the third Latin American writer to receive this distinction.

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Amster Cats, Maurizio

Amster Cats, Maurizio
According to his ID, Maurizio was of Spanish nationality, born on 06-04-1907 in Lwow (Poland). He was married and was accompanied by his wife Abelarda Amenedo Meraldino, born on 10-3-1912 in Coruña in Galicia, . Maurizio’s worked as a artist. Oval face, brown eyes, black hair. He travelled on the Winnipeg.

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The Winged Winnipeg- Neruda

The Winged Winnipeg- Neruda
From the beginning I liked the word Winnipeg. Words have wings or they don’t. The rough ones stick to the paper, to the table, to the earth. The word Winnipeg is ‘winged’. I saw it flying for the first time in a dock of steamers near Bordeaux. It was a beautiful old ship, with that dignity given by The Seven Seas, over time. The truth is that the cargo vessel had never taken more than 70 or 80 people on board. The rest was cacao, sacks of coffee and rice, minerals. Now it was destined for a different kind of cargo: that of hope. 9Pablo Neruda0

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Miguel and José Ballester Soriano. A mother who never again was able to hug and kiss his children.

Miguel and José Ballester Soriano married two sisters Juana Hilda Laferte Chávez and Luz Marina Lafertt Chávez (a typographical error in the first surname that passed to the children). My aunt Marina and her eldest daughter came to Spain at the beginning of the 60s, to meet my uncles’ parents and the rest of the family. They were 5 brothers, 2 died, two were exiled and these two brothers, when their parents died, inivited the other brother to go to Chile and see each other. On the trip he met Nino Bravo, I think that when he came to Chile, he talked more about it than about his brothers and nephews.
Three years ago I found out that they traveled in the Winnipeg (I got in touch with Jaime Cardona Jasenwirth and he gave me a lot of information about my uncles, today Ana Calero San Martín has contacted me, both descendants of the Winnipeg passengers), in addition I had hearded the name of Pablo Neruda in my house. Miguel and José Ballester Soriano were my mother’s first cousins and the relationship with their parents was always very close. Their mother and my grandmother were sisters but even though they had two more brothers, my great aunt always leaned on my grandmother, she would bring up the letters the family sent so that my sister could read them to her and answer them.
They sent pictures every year, I do not remember them because I was very young, and apparently my mother and her brother also sent photos of us, because when my uncle José came to Chile, out of all the cousins, he could only recognized my mother and his brother. My uncle José and his wife lived two years here in Chile and with the Pinochet’s dictatorship, he had to leave Chile to East Germany, however, his children, brothers and nephews stayed. A friend got them a job in Venezuela and they travelled there. He said: “there we are at least halfway”. In 1984 my uncle Miguel died, uncle José wrote to let us know. What I don’t remember is if he had already returned to Chile. In 1997 my uncle José died. The communication with our part of the family was cut off, but I know they keep in touch with their cousins . Now that I have been able to see the photos of my uncle José when he was doing all the paperwork to stay in Chile, I have understood why my mother’s brother recognized him when he saw him pass in the car that brought him to the village, he looks a lot like his brother Rafael who died here.
My great aunt used to say: of 5 children, 4 have died, to which my grandmother replied: “Elvira do not say that, they and you have a family on the other side of the world.” YES BUT I WILL NEVER BE ABLE TO HUG THEM AGAIN. This is just what I remember or what I heard my mother saying, I’m not sure, about when my uncle lived in Spain in the 70s, I miss them.

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A labor of Love by Neruda

I put them in my boat.
It was daylight and France
her fancy dress
of every day she had at that time,
it was
the same clarity of wine and air
her clothes of forest goddess.
My ship expected
with its remote name “Winnipeg”
But my Spanish were not coming
from Versailles,
from the silvery dance,
from the old amaranth carpets,
from the cups chirping
with wine,
no, they were not coming from there,
no, they were not coming from there,
From further away,
from prison camps,
from the black sand
from the Sahara,
from rough hiding places
where they lay
hungry and naked,
there to my clear boat,
to the ship at sea, to hope
they arrived called one by one
by me, from their prisons,
from the fortress
from the shaky France
called by my mouth
arrived,
Saavedra, I said, and came the mason,
Zuniga, I said, and there he was,
Roces, I called, and arrived with grim smile,
I shouted, Alberti! and with hands of quartz
the poetry arrived.
Laborers, carpenters,
fishermen,
turners, machinists,
potters, tanners:
the boat was becoming populated
parting to my homeland.
I felt in my fingers
the seeds
from Spain
that I rescued myself and scattered
over the sea, directed
to the peace
of the prairies.
(Neruda)

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