Pablo Neruda

One hundred years ago today, Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto was born in Chile. Something happened to him fairly early on in life: in his own words, poetry arrived (read his poem about it below). He is better known by his pen name, which he later legally adopted, Pablo Neruda. He was a doctrinaire Communist, fought for the side of evil in the Spanish Civil War, received the Stalin Prize, and wrote some awful Commie doggerel here and there.

However, when he was good, he was very good. He could write poetry that sliced straight to the heart of the matter. His use of imagery can be startling, lyrical and chilling all at the same time. His poetry can be translated, although it does lose something when it is not in Spanish. Neruda is one of those artists, like Picasso, like David whose work and artistry transcends the artists’ reptilian philosophy. That is the crucial difference between Neruda and Paul Robeson: while Neruda still could tap into the Good, the True and the Beautiful, Robeson was nothing more than a bitter, nasty, ham actor and overblown minstrel singer. Even though both celebrated and loved Joseph Stalin, I can celebrate Neruda with a clear conscience.

Neruda also looked a lot like Philippe Noiret, one of my all time favorite actors, who played Neruda in Il Postino. Since Neruda was older, I suppose it is more correct to say that Noiret looks a lot like Neruda, but the resemblance is uncanny. The only closer resemblance I have seen in a biopic was Ed Harris as Jackson Pollock.

I found this translation of one of his poems on the Internet:

POETRY

And it was at that age...Poetry arrived
in search of me. I don't know, I don't know where
it came from, from winter or a river.
I don't know how or when,
no, they were not voices, they were not
words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent fires
or returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.

I did not know what to say, my mouth
had no way
with names
my eyes were blind,
and something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering
that fire
and I wrote the first faint line,
faint, without substance, pure
nonsense,
pure wisdom
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw
the heavens
unfastened
and open,
planets,
palpitating planations,
shadow perforated,
riddled
with arrows, fire and flowers,
the winding night, the universe.

And I, infinitesmal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
I felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke free on the open sky.