Neruda, Pablo

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[[Image:Pablo Neruda reading aloud.jpg|thumb|300px|Neruda recording poems at the U.S. [[Library of Congress]] in 1966]]
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'''Pablo Neruda''' ([[July 12]] [[1904]] – [[September 23]] [[1973]]) was the pen name of the [[Chile]]an writer '''Ricardo Eliecer Neftalí Reyes Basoalto'''.
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{{epname|Neruda, Pablo}}{{Copyedited}}             
  
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Translated into dozens of languages, Pablo Neruda is considered one of the greatest and most influential poets of the 20th century. Critic and biographer Alistar Reid has stated that Neruda is the most widely read poet since William Shakespeare.  
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{{Infobox Writer <!-- for more information see [[:Template:Infobox Writer/doc]] —>
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| name = Pablo Neruda
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| awards = {{awd|[[Nobel Prize in Literature]]|1971}}
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| image = Pablo Neruda.jpg
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| birthname = Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto
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| birthdate = {{birth date|1904|7|12|mf=y}}
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| birthplace = [[Parral, Chile|Parral]], [[Chile]]
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| deathdate = {{death date and age|1973|9|23|1904|7|12|mf=y}}
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| deathplace = [[Santiago, Chile|Santiago]], [[Chile]]
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| occupation = [[Poet]], [[Diplomat]], [[Political figure]]
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}}
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'''Pablo Neruda''' (July 12, 1904 &ndash; September 23, 1973) was the pen name of the Chilean poet '''Ricardo Eliecer Neftalí Reyes Basoalto.''' Neruda is considered one of the greatest poets of the twentieth century and one of the most influential figures in the history of Latin American literature. Neruda's poetry is renowned for its fantastic imagery and surreal use of language, forming a critical link between the [[Surrealism|Surrealist]] movement of early twentieth-century Spain and the [[Magical Realism]] of the latter twentieth-century in South America.  
  
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Neruda was accomplished in a wide variety of styles, ranging from erotically charged love poems, [[surrealist]] poems, historical epics, and overtly political manifestos. Some of Neruda's most beloved poems are his "Odes to Common Things," collected in several volumes. [[Colombian]] novelist [[Gabriel García Márquez]] has called him  "the greatest poet of the 20th century in any language".  In 1971, Neruda was awarded the [[Nobel Prize for Literature]] after several years of being overlooked for his political activism.  
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Surrealism was an attempt to tap into the unconscious mind, to produce a dream-like work of art that explored  truth that was "surreal," or beyond reality. Magical Realism was a literary movement of the latter half of the twentieth century, especially associated with Latin American authors, that introduced certain "magic" or fantasy elements into an otherwise realistic setting.  
  
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During his lifetime, Neruda occupied many diplomatic posts and served a stint as senator for the Chilean Communist Party. When Conservative Chilean President Videla outlawed communism in Chile, a warrant was issued for Neruda's arrest. Friends hid him for months in a basement of a home in the Chilean port of Valparaiso. Neruda then escaped into exile through a mountain pass into Argentina.
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Like many intellectuals of his era, Neruda was a committed leftist who supported [[Joseph Stalin|Stalin]], only later to be disillusioned by revelations of Stalin's totalitarian machinery of government, Neruda remained a committed [[communism|communist]] who supported the socialist Chilean President [[Salvador Allende]] shortly before the poet's death. Unlike European socialists, Neruda was affected by the split not only between East and West, but between North and South and the economic inequities that socialism promised to remedy.  
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Years later, Neruda was a close collaborator to Socialist President Salvador Allende. Upon returning to Chile after his Nobel Prize acceptance speech, Allende invited Neruda to read at the Chilean national soccer stadium before 70,000 people, the largest poetry reading in recorded history.
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Neruda's poetry directly influenced a great number of South American writers, [[Gabriel Garcia-Marquez]], [[Julio Cortazar]], and [[Isabel Allende]] among them. Neruda won the [[Nobel Prize]] for Literature in 1971, a controversial award because of his support of Stalin and his long-standing communist sympathies.  
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Pablo Neruda died of heart failure twelve days after the Chilean coup d'état led by Augusto Pinochet. Already a legend in life, Neruda's death became charged with an intense symbolism that reverberated around the world. Pinochet had denied permision to transform Neruda's funeral into a public event, but thousands of grieving Chileans disobeyed the curfew, flooding the streets in tribute. Neruda's funeral became the first public protest against the Chilean military dictatorship.
 
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Neruda's pen name was derived from [[Czech people|Czech]] writer and poet [[Jan Neruda]]; it later became his legal name.
 
  
 
==Life==
 
==Life==
 
===Early years===
 
===Early years===
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Neruda was born in [[Parral, Chile|Parral]], a city in [[Linares, Chile|Linares]] province in the Maule Region, some 350 km south of [[Santiago, Chile|Santiago]]. His father, José del Carmen Reyes Morales, was a railway employee; his mother, Rosa Neftalí Basoalto Opazo, was a schoolteacher who died two months after he was born. Neruda and his father soon moved to [[Temuco]], where his father married Trinidad Candia Marverde, a woman with whom he had had a child nine years earlier, a boy named Rodolfo. Neruda also grew up with his half-sister Laura, one of his father's children by another woman.
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Pablo Neruda was born in Parral, a city in Linares province, some 350 kilometers south of Santiago, [[Chile]]. His father, José del Carmen Reyes Morales, was a poor railway employee; his mother, Rosa Neftalí Basoalto Opazo, was a schoolteacher who died two months after he was born. Neruda and his father soon moved to Temuco, where his father married Trinidad Candia Marverde, the woman with whom he had fathered a child nine years earlier, a boy named Rodolfo. Neruda also grew up with his half-sister Laura, one of his father's children by another woman.
  
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The young Neruda was called "Neftalí", his late mother's middle name. His interest in writing and literature was opposed by his father, but he received encouragement from others, including future Nobel Prize winner [[Gabriela Mistral]], who headed the local girls' school. His first published work was an essay he wrote for the local daily newspaper, ''La Mañana'', at the age of thirteen: ''Entusiasmo y perseverancia'' ("Enthusiasm and Perseverance"). By 1920, when he adopted the pseudonym of Pablo Neruda, he was a published author of poetry, prose, and journalism.
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The young Neruda was called "Neftalí", his late mother's middle name. His interest in writing and literature was opposed by his father, but he received encouragement from others, including [[Gabriela Mistral]], who headed the local girls' school at that time, and later won the Nobel Prize for Literature. His first published work was an essay for the local daily newspaper, ''La Mañana'', at the age of 13. By 1920, when he adopted the pseudonym of Pablo Neruda, he was a published author of poetry, prose, and journalism.
  
 
===''Veinte poemas''===
 
===''Veinte poemas''===
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In the following year (1921), he moved to [[Santiago,_Chile|Santiago]] to study [[French language|French]] at the [[Universidad de Chile]] with the intention of becoming a teacher, but soon Neruda was devoting himself full time to poetry. In 1923 his first volume of verse, ''Crepusculario'' ("Book of Twilights"), was published, followed the next year by ''Veinte poemas de amor y una canción desesperada'' ("Twenty Poems of Love and a Song of Despair"), a collection of love poems that was controversial for its eroticism. Both works were critically acclaimed and were translated into many languages. Over the decades, ''Veinte poemas'' would sell millions of copies and become Neruda's best-known work.
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In the following year (1921), he moved to Santiago to study French at the Universidad de Chile with the intention of becoming a teacher, but soon was devoting himself full time to poetry. In 1923 his first volume of verse, ''Crepusculario'' ''("Book of Twilights"),'' was published, followed the next year by ''Veinte poemas de amor y una canción desesperada'' ''("Twenty Love-Poems and a Song of Despair"),'' a collection of love poems that were controversial for their explicitness. Both works were critically acclaimed and were translated into many languages. Over the decades, ''Veinte poemas'' would sell millions of copies and become Neruda's best-known work. ''Veinte poemas'' exemplifies Neruda's style of surreal, almost magical imagery, as well as his graceful use of free, unmetered verse. Here, as an example of this early style, is the beginning of the love-poem entitled ''Ah the vastness of pines'':
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:Ah vastness of pines, murmur of waves breaking,
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:slow play of lights, solitary bell,
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:twilight falling in your eyes, toy doll,
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:earth-shell, in whom the earth sings!
  
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Neruda's reputation was growing both inside and outside of [[Chile]], but he was plagued by poverty. In 1927, out of desperation, he took an honorary consulship in [[Yangon|Rangoon]], then a part of colonial [[Myanmar|Burma]] and a place of which he had never before heard. Later, he worked stints in [[Colombo]] ([[Ceylon]]), [[Jakarta|Batavia]] ([[Java (island)|Java]]), and [[Singapore]]. In Java he met and married his first wife, a tall Dutch bank employee named Maryka Antonieta Hagenaar Vogelzang. While on diplomatic service, Neruda read large amounts of poetry and experimented with many different poetic forms. He wrote the first two volumes of ''Residencia en la tierra,'' which included many [[Surrealism|surrealistic]] poems, later to become famous.
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Neruda's reputation was growing both inside and outside of Chile, but he was plagued by poverty. In 1927, out of desperation, he took an honorary consulship in Rangoon, then a part of colonial Burma. Later, he worked in Ceylon, Jakarta, and [[Singapore]]. In Jakarta he met and married his first wife, a tall Dutch bank employee named Maryka Antonieta Hagenaar Vogelzang. While on diplomatic service, Neruda read large amounts of poetry and experimented with many different poetic forms. He wrote the first two volumes of ''Residencia en la tierra,'' which included many [[Surrealism|surreal]] poems, later to become famous.
  
 
===Spanish Civil War===
 
===Spanish Civil War===
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After returning to Chile, Neruda was given diplomatic posts in [[Buenos Aires]] and then [[Barcelona]], [[Spain]]. He later replaced Gabriela Mistral as consul in [[Madrid]], where he became the center of a lively literary circle, befriending such writers as [[Rafael Alberti]], [[Federico García Lorca]], and the [[Peru]]vian poet [[César Vallejo]]. A daughter, Malva Marina Trinidad, was born in Madrid; she was to be plagued with health problems for the whole of her short life. During this period, Neruda became slowly estranged from his wife and took up with Delia del Carril, an [[Argentina|Argentine]] woman who was twenty years his senior and who would eventually become his second wife.   
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After returning to Chile, Neruda was given diplomatic posts in [[Buenos Aires]] and then Barcelona, [[Spain]]. He later replaced Gabriela Mistral as consul in Madrid, where he became the center of a lively literary circle, befriending such writers as Rafael Alberti, [[Federico García Lorca]], and the Peruvian poet [[César Vallejo]]. During this period, Neruda became slowly estranged from his wife and took up with Delia del Carril, an [[Argentina|Argentine]] woman who would eventually become his second wife.   
  
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As Spain became engulfed in [[Spanish Civil War|civil war]], Neruda became profoundly politicized for the first time. His experiences of the Spanish Civil War and its aftermath moved him away from individualistic, inwardly focused work towards social commitment and greater solidarity. Neruda became an ardent [[communist]], and remained so for the rest of his life. The radical leftist politics of his literary friends, as well as that of del Carril, were contributing factors, but the most important catalyst was the execution of [[García Lorca]] by forces loyal to [[Francisco Franco]]. By means of his speeches and writings, Neruda threw his support behind the Republican side, publishing a collection of poetry called ''España en el corazón'' ("Spain in My Heart"). Neruda’s wife and child moved to [[Monte Carlo]]; he was never to see either of them again. He took up full time with del Carril in [[France]].
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As Spain became engulfed in civil war, Neruda became profoundly politicized for the first time. His experiences of the Spanish Civil War and its aftermath moved him away from individualistic, inwardly-focused work towards works that were socially and politically engaged. Neruda became an ardent communist, and remained so for the rest of his life. The radical leftist politics of his literary friends, as well as that of his second wife were contributing factors, but the most important catalyst was the execution of García Lorca by forces loyal to [[Francisco Franco]].  
  
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Following the election in 1938 of President [[Pedro Aguirre Cerda]], whom Neruda supported, he was appointed special consul for Spanish emigration in [[Paris]]. There Neruda was given responsibility for what he called "the noblest mission I have ever undertaken": shipping 2,000 Spanish refugees, who had been housed by the French in squalid camps, to Chile on an old boat called the ''Winnipeg''. Neruda is sometimes charged with strongly favoring Communists for emigration while excluding others who had fought on the side of the Republic; others deny these accusations, pointing out that Neruda chose only a few hundred of the refugees personally; the rest were selected by the Service for the Evacuation of Spanish Refugees, set up by [[Juan Negrín]], president of the Spanish Republican government-in-exile.
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Following the election in 1938 of President Pedro Aguirre Cerda, whom Neruda supported, he was appointed special consul for Spanish emigration in [[Paris]]. There Neruda was given responsibility for what he called "the noblest mission I have ever undertaken": shipping 2,000 Spanish refugees, who had been housed by the French in squalid camps, to Chile on an old boat called the ''Winnipeg.''
  
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===Mexico===
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===Return to Chile===
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Neruda's next diplomatic post was as Consul General in [[Mexico City]], where he spent the years 1940 to 1943. While in Mexico, he divorced Hagenaar, married del Carril, and learned that his daughter had died, aged eight, in the Nazi-occupied [[Netherlands]] from her many health problems. He also became a friend of the Stalinist assassin [[Vittorio Vidali]] [http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:RG1ai3t2lAwJ:trovamex.com/n/modules.php%3Fname%3DNews%26file%3Darticle%26sid%3D4+Neruda+%22Vittorio+vidali%22&hl=en].
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In 1943, following a three-year stint as Consul General to Mexico City, Neruda made a tour of [[Peru]], where he visited Machu Picchu. The austere beauty of the [[Inca]] citadel later inspired ''Alturas de Macchu Picchu'', a book-length poem in twelve parts which he completed in 1945, marking a growing awareness and interest in the ancient civilizations of the Americas, themes he was to explore further in ''Canto General''. In this work, Neruda celebrated the achievement of Machu Picchu, but also condemned the slavery which had made it possible. In what is perhaps the most famous part of the poem, Canto XII, Neruda calls upon the dead of many centuries to be born again and to speak through him, to rejuvenate the spirit of South America:
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After the failed 1940 assassination attempt against [[Leon Trotsky]], Neruda arranged a Chilean visa for the Mexican painter [[David Alfaro Siqueiros]], accused of having been one of the conspirators. Neruda later said he did it at the request of Mexican President [[Manuel Ávila Camacho]]. This enabled Siqueiros, then jailed, to leave Mexico for Chile, where he stayed at Neruda's private residence. In exchange for Neruda's assistance, Siqueiros spent over a year painting a mural in a school in [[Chillán]]. Neruda's relationship with Siqueiros attracted criticism and Neruda dismissed the allegations that his intent had been to help an assassin as "sensationalist politico-literary harassment".
 
  
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===Return to Chile===
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:Arise to birth with me, my brother.
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In 1943, following his return to Chile, Neruda made a tour of [[Peru]], where he visited [[Machu Picchu]]. The austere beauty of the [[Inca]] citadel later inspired ''Alturas de Macchu Picchu'', a book-length poem in twelve parts which he completed in 1945 and which marked a growing awareness and interest in the ancient civilizations of the Americas: themes he was to explore further in ''[[Canto General]]''. In this work, Neruda celebrated the achievement of [[Machu Picchu]], but also condemned the slavery which had made it possible. In the Canto XII, he called upon the dead of many centuries to be born again and to speak through him. [[Martin Espada]], poet and professor of creative writing at the [[University of Massachusetts]], has hailed the work as a masterpiece, declaring that "there is no greater political poem".
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:Give me your hand out of the depths
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:sown by your sorrows.
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:You will not return from these stone fastnesses.
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:You will not emerge from subterranean time.
  
 
===Neruda and Stalinism===
 
===Neruda and Stalinism===
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Bolstered by his experiences in the Spanish Civil War, Neruda, like many left-leaning intellectuals of his generation, came to admire the [[Soviet Union]] of [[Joseph Stalin]], partly for the role it played in defeating [[Nazi Germany]] (poems ''Canto a Stalingrado'' (1942) and 'Nuevo canto de amor a Stalingrado' (1943)). In 1953 Neruda was awarded the [[Stalin Peace Prize]]. On Stalin's death that same year, Neruda wrote an ode to him, as he has also (during [[World War II]]) wrote praise of [[Fulgencio Batista]] (''Saludo a Batista'', i.e ''Salute to Batista'') and later of [[Fidel Castro]] [http://libros.libertaddigital.com/articulo.php/1276229962].
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Bolstered by his experiences in the Spanish Civil War, Neruda, like many left-leaning intellectuals of his generation, came to admire the [[Soviet Union]], partly for the role it played in defeating [[Nazi Germany]] (poems ''Canto a Stalingrado'' (1942) and 'Nuevo canto de amor a Stalingrado' (1943)). In 1953 Neruda was awarded the Stalin Peace Prize.  
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His fervent Stalinism eventually drove a wedge between Neruda and longtime friend [[Octavio Paz]] who commented that "''Neruda became more and more Stalinist, while I became less and less enchanted with Stalin''". Their differences came to a head after the 1939 Nazi-Soviet [[Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact]] when they almost came to blows in an argument over Stalin. Although Paz still considered Neruda "''the greatest poet of his generation''", in an essay on [[Solzhenitsyn]] he wrote that when he "''thinks of … Neruda and other famous Stalinist writers I feel the gooseflesh that I get from reading certain passages of Dante’s Inferno. No doubt they began in good faith, but insensibly, commitment by commitment, they saw themselves becoming entangled in a mesh of lies, falsehoods, deceits and perjuries, until they lost their souls.''"
 
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In ode written on the occasion of [[Stalin]]'s death, Neruda wrote: “To be men! That is the [[Stalinism|Stalinist]] law! . . ./We must learn from Stalin/ his sincere intensity/ his concrete clarity. . . . [...] And [[Stalin]], the giant,/ Carried her at the heights of his forehead. . . ./A wave beats against the stones of the shore./But [[Malenkov]] will continue his work.”(full English translation [http://www.weeklystandard.com/Utilities/printer_preview.asp?idArticle=4328])
 
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Neruda also called [[Lenin]] the "great genius of this century". Another speech ([[June 5]], [[1946]]) is a tribute to the late Soviet leader [[Mikhail Kalinin]], who for Neruda was "man of noble life", "the great constructor of the future", "a comrade of arms of Lenin and Stalin". [http://libros.libertaddigital.com/articulo.php/1276229541]
 
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Neruda later came to rue his support of the Russian leader; after [[Nikita Khrushchev]]'s famous [[Secret Speech]] [[20th Party Congress]] in 1956, in which he denounced the "[[cult of personality]]" that surrounded Stalin and accused him of  committing crimes during the [[Great Purges]], Neruda wrote in his memoirs "I had contributed to my share to the personality cult," explaining that "in those days, Stalin seemed to us the conqueror who had crushed [[Hitler]]'s armies". Of a subsequent visit to [[China]] in 1957, Neruda would later write: "What has estranged me from the Chinese revolutionary process has not been [[Mao Zedong|Mao Tse-tung]] but Mao Tse-tungism", which he dubbed Mao Tse-Stalinism: "the repetition of a cult of a Socialist deity". However, despite his disillusionment with Stalin, Neruda never lost his essential faith in communism and remained loyal to "the Party". Anxious not to give ammunition to his ideological enemies, he would later refuse publicly to condemn the Soviet repression of [[dissident]] writers like [[Boris Pasternak]] and [[Joseph Brodsky]]: an attitude with which even some of his staunchest admirers disagreed.
 
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===Senator===
 
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On [[March 4]] [[1945]] Neruda was elected a [[Communist]] party [[Senate of Chile|senator]] for the northern provinces of [[Antofagasta]] and [[Tarapacá Region|Tarapacá]] in the arid and inhospitable [[Atacama Desert]]. He officially joined the [[Communist Party of Chile]] four months later.
 
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In 1946, Radical Party presidential candidate [[Gabriel González Videla]] asked Neruda to act as his campaign manager. González Videla was supported by a coalition of left-wing parties and Neruda fervently campaigned on his behalf. Once in office, however, González Videla turned against the Communist Party. The breaking point for Senator Neruda was the violent repression of a Communist-led miners' strike in [[Lota, Chile|Lota]] in October 1947, where striking workers were herded into island military prisons and a concentration camp in the town of [[Pisagua]]. Neruda's criticism of González Videla culminated in a dramatic speech in the Chilean senate on [[6 January]] [[1948]] called ''Yo acuso'' ("I accuse"), in the course of which he read out the names of the miners and their families who were imprisoned at the concentration camp.
 
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===Exile===
 
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A few weeks later, Neruda went into hiding and he and his wife were smuggled from house to house, hidden by supporters and admirers for the next thirteen months. Whilst in hiding, Senator Neruda was removed from office and in September 1948 the Communist Party was banned altogether under the ''Ley de Defensa Permanente de la Democracia'' (Law for the Permanent Defense of Democracy), called by critics the ''Ley Maldita'' ("Accursed Law"), which eliminated over 26,000 people from the electoral registers, thus stripping them of their right to vote. Neruda's life underground ended in March 1949 when he fled over the [[Andes Mountains]] to [[Argentina]] on horseback, nearly drowning while crossing the [[Curringue River]]. He would dramatically recount his escape from Chile in his Nobel Prize lecture.
 
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Once out of Chile, he spent the next three years in exile. In [[Buenos Aires]] a friend of Neruda, the future Nobel winner and novelist [[Miguel Ángel Asturias]], was cultural attaché to the Guatemalan embassy. There was some slight resemblance between the two men, so Neruda went to Europe using Asturias's passport. [[Pablo Picasso]] arranged his entrance into [[Paris]] and Neruda made a surprise appearance there to a stunned [[World Congress of Peace Forces]], the Chilean government meanwhile denying that the poet could have escaped the country. 
 
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Neruda spent those three years travelling extensively throughout [[Europe]] as well as taking trips to [[India]], [[China]], and the [[USSR]]. His trip to [[Mexico]] in late 1949 was lengthened due to a serious bout of [[phlebitis]]. A Chilean singer named [[Matilde Urrutia]] was hired to care for him and they began an affair that would, years later, culminate in marriage. During his exile, Urrutia would travel from country to country shadowing him and they would arrange meetings whenever they could.
 
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While in Mexico Neruda also published his lengthy epic poem ''[[Canto General]]'', a [[Walt Whitman|Whitmanesque]] catalog of the history, geography, and flora and fauna of [[South America]], accompanied by Neruda's observations and experiences. Many of them dealt with his time underground in Chile, which is when he composed much of the poem. In fact, he had carried the manuscript with him on his escape on horseback. A month later, a different edition of five thousand copies was boldly published in Chile by the outlawed Communist Party based on a manuscript Neruda had left behind.  
 
  
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His 1952 stay in a villa owned by [[Italy|Italian]] historian [[Edwin Cerio]] on the island of [[Capri]] was fictionalized in the popular film ''[[Il Postino]]'' ("The Postman", 1994).
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Neruda's fervent Stalinism eventually drove a wedge between him and his longtime friend and writer [[Octavio Paz]] who commented that, "''Neruda became more and more Stalinist, while I became less and less.''" Although Paz still considered Neruda "the greatest poet of his generation", in an essay on [[Alexander Solzhenitsyn]] he wrote that when he "thinks of … Neruda and other famous Stalinist writers I feel the gooseflesh that I get from reading certain passages of [[Dante]]’s ''Inferno.'' No doubt they began in good faith, but insensibly, commitment by commitment, they saw themselves becoming entangled in a mesh of lies, falsehoods, deceits and perjuries, until they lost their souls."
  
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===Return to Chile===
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Neruda later came to rue his support of the Russian leader; after [[Nikita Khrushchev]]'s famous Secret Speech at the twentieth Party Congress in 1956, in which he denounced the [[cult of personality]] that surrounded Stalin and accused him of committing crimes during the [[Great Purges]], Neruda wrote in his memoirs: "I had contributed my share to the personality cult," explaining that "in those days, Stalin seemed to us the conqueror who had crushed Hitler's armies." On a subsequent visit to [[China]] in 1957, Neruda would later write: "What has estranged me from the Chinese revolutionary process has not been [[Mao Zedong|Mao Tse-tung]] but Mao Tse-tungism," which he dubbed Mao Tse-Stalinism: "the repetition of a cult of a Socialist deity." However, despite his disillusionment with Stalin, Neruda never lost his essential faith in communism and remained loyal to its ideals.
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By 1952, the González-Videla dictatorship was on its last legs, weakened by corruption scandals. The Chilean Socialist Party was in the process of nominating [[Salvador Allende]] as its candidate for the September 1952 presidential elections and was keen to have the presence of Neruda &mdash; by now Chile's most prominent left-wing literary figure &mdash; to support the campaign.  
 
  
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Neruda returned in August of that year and rejoined [[Delia del Carril]], who had travelled ahead of him some months earlier, but the marriage was crumbling. Del Carril eventually learned of his torrid affair with [[Matilde Urrutia]] and left him in [[1955]], moving back to Europe. Now united with Urrutia, Neruda would spend the rest of his life in Chile, many foreign trips notwithstanding and a stint as Allende's ambassador to France from 1970 to 1973.
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===Political career===
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On March 4, 1945 Neruda was elected a Communist party senator for the northern provinces of Antofagasta and Tarapacá in the arid and inhospitable Atacama Desert. In 1946, Radical Party presidential candidate Gabriel González Videla asked Neruda to act as his campaign manager. González Videla was supported by a coalition of left-wing parties and Neruda fervently campaigned on his behalf. Once in office, however, González Videla turned against the Communist Party. The breaking point for Senator Neruda was the violent repression of a Communist-led miners' strike in October 1947, in which striking workers were herded into island military prisons and a concentration camp in the town of Pisagua. Neruda's criticism of González Videla culminated in a dramatic speech in the Chilean senate on January 6, 1948 called ''Yo acuso'' ("I accuse"), in the course of which he read out the names of the miners and their families who were imprisoned at the concentration camp.
  
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By this time, Neruda enjoyed worldwide fame as a poet, and his books were being translated into virtually all the major languages of the world. He was also vocal on political issues, vigorously denouncing the U.S. during the [[Cuban missile crisis]] (later in the decade he would likewise repeatedly condemn the U.S. for the [[Vietnam War]]). But being one of the most prestigious and outspoken leftwing intellectuals alive also attracted opposition from ideological opponents. The [[Congress for Cultural Freedom]], an anti-communist organization covertly established and funded by the U.S. [[Central Intelligence Agency]], adopted Neruda as one of its primary targets and launched a campaign to undermine his reputation, reviving the old claim he had been an accomplice in the attack on Trotsky in Mexico City in 1940. The campaign became more intense when it became known that Neruda was a candidate for the 1964 Nobel prize, which was eventually awarded to [[Jean-Paul Sartre]].
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===Exile and return===
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A few weeks later, Neruda went into hiding and he and his wife were smuggled from house to house, hidden by supporters and admirers for the next 13 months. While in hiding, Neruda was removed from office and in September 1948 the Communist Party was banned altogether under the ''Ley de Defensa Permanente de la Democracia'' (Law for the Permanent Defense of Democracy) which eliminated over 26,000 people from the electoral registers, thus stripping them of their right to vote. Neruda's life underground ended in March 1949 when he fled over the Andes Mountains to [[Argentina]] on horseback. He would dramatically recount his escape from Chile in his Nobel Prize lecture.  
  
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In 1966, Neruda was invited to attend an [[International PEN]] conference in New York City. Officially, he was barred from entering the U.S. because he was a communist, but the conference organizer, playwright [[Arthur Miller]], eventually prevailed upon the [[Lyndon B. Johnson|Johnson]] Administration to grant Neruda a visa. Neruda gave readings to packed halls, and even recorded some poems for the [[Library of Congress]]. Miller later opined that Neruda's adherence to his communist ideals of the 1930s was a result of his protracted exclusion from "bourgeois society". Due to the presence of many [[East Bloc]] writers, Mexican writer [[Carlos Fuentes]] later wrote that the PEN conference marked a "beginning of the end" of the [[Cold War]].
+
Neruda spent the next three years traveling extensively throughout [[Europe]] as well as taking trips to [[India]], [[China]], and the [[Soviet Union]]. While in Mexico Neruda also published his lengthy epic poem ''Canto General,'' a [[Walt Whitman|Whitman]]-inspired catalog of the history, geography, and flora and fauna of [[South America]], accompanied by observations and experiences.
  
−
Upon Neruda's return to Chile, he stopped off in Peru, where he gave readings to enthusiastic crowds in Lima and [[Arequipa]] and was received by President [[Fernando Belaúnde Terry]]. However, the visit prompted an unpleasant backlash. The Peruvian government had come out against the government in [[Cuba]] of [[Fidel Castro]], and in July 1966 retaliation against Neruda came in the form of a letter signed by more than one hundred Cuban intellectuals who charged Neruda with colluding with the enemy, and called him an example of the "tepid, pro-Yankee revisionism" then prevalent in Latin America. The affair was particularly painful for Neruda because of his previous outspoken support for the Cuban revolution, and he never visited the island again, even after an invitation in 1968.  
+
By 1952, the González-Videla dictatorship was on its last legs, weakened by corruption scandals. The Chilean Socialist Party was in the process of nominating [[Salvador Allende]] as its candidate for the September 1952 presidential elections and was keen to have the presence of Neruda—by then considered Chile's most prominent left-wing literary figure—to support the campaign.  
  
−
After the death of [[Che Guevara]] in [[Bolivia]] in 1967, Neruda wrote several articles regretting the loss of a "great hero", but privately he condemned Guevara's adventurism.
+
By that time, Neruda enjoyed worldwide fame as a poet, and his books were being translated into most major languages of the world. He was also vocal on political issues, vigorously denouncing the U.S. during the [[Cuban Missile Crisis]]. As one of the most prestigious and outspoken leftwing intellectuals, he also attracted opposition from ideological opponents.
  
 
===Final years===
 
===Final years===
 +
In 1970, Neruda was nominated as a candidate for the Chilean presidency, but he gave his support to [[Salvador Allende]], who won the election and was inaugurated in 1970 as the first democratically-elected socialist head of state. Shortly thereafter, Allende appointed Neruda the Chilean ambassador to France (lasting from 1970-1972; his final diplomatic posting). After two years Neruda returned to Chile due to failing health.
  
−
In 1970, Neruda was nominated as a candidate for the Chilean presidency, but ended up giving his support to [[Salvador Allende]], who later won the election and was inaugurated in 1970 as the first democratically elected socialist head of state. Shortly thereafter, Allende appointed Neruda the Chilean ambassador to France (lasting from 1970-1972; his final diplomatic posting).  Neruda returned to Chile two and half years later due to failing health.
+
In 1971, having sought the prize for years, Neruda was finally awarded the [[Nobel Prize]] for Literature "for a poetry that with the action of an elemental force brings alive a continent's destiny and dreams." This decision did not come easily, as some of the committee members had not forgotten Neruda's past praise of Stalinist dictatorship. As the Chilean coup of 1973 unfolded, Neruda, then deathly ill from prostate cancer, was devastated by the mounting attacks on the Allende government. The final military coup led by General [[Augusto Pinochet]] on September 11 saw Neruda's hopes for a socialist and democratic Chile literally go up in flames. Shortly thereafter, during a search of the house and grounds at Isla Negra by Chilean armed forces at which he was present, Neruda famously remarked:  
−
 
 
−
In 1971, having sought the prize for years, Neruda was finally awarded the [[Nobel Prize]]. This decision did not came easily, as some of the committee members had not forgotten Neruda's past praise of Stalinist dictatorship. But his Swedish translator, [[Artur Lundkvist]], did his best to ensure the Chilean the prize.<ref>http://www.weeklystandard.com/Utilities/printer_preview.asp?idArticle=4328 A critical review</ref>
 
−
 
 
−
As the [[Chilean coup of 1973|disturbances of 1973]] unfolded, Neruda, then deathly ill from [[prostate cancer]], was devastated by the mounting attacks on the Allende government. The final military coup led by General [[Augusto Pinochet]] on [[11 September]] saw Neruda's hopes for a socialist and democratic Chile literally go up in flames. Shortly thereafter, during a search of the house and grounds at Isla Negra by Chilean armed forces at which he was present, Neruda famously remarked:  
 
 
<blockquote>
 
<blockquote>
−
''Look around &mdash; there's only one thing of danger for you here &mdash; poetry.''
+
''Look around—there's only one thing of danger to you here—poetry.''
 
</blockquote>
 
</blockquote>
−
Neruda died of [[leukemia]] on the evening of [[September 23]], [[1973]], at Santiago's Santa María Clinic. Subsequent to his death, Neruda's homes in both Valparaiso and Santiago were looted and vandalized. His wife, as a way of drawing world attention to the ongoing conduct of Pinochet's [[junta]], moved his body to lie in state amidst the rubble in the couple's Santiago house La Chascona, which had just been violently ransacked by the armed forces. His funeral took place with a massive police presence, and mourners took advantage of the occasion to protest the Pinochet regime.
 
  
−
Matilde Urrutia subsequently compiled and edited for publication the memoirs that Neruda had been working on just days prior to his death. These and other activities brought her into conflict with Pinochet's government, which continually sought to curtail Neruda's influence on the Chilean collective consciousness. Indeed, Neruda's poetry was outlawed in Chile by the junta until the restoration of democracy in 1990. Urrutia's own memoir, ''My Life with Pablo Neruda'', was published posthumously in 1986.
+
Neruda died of heart failure on the evening of September 23, 1973, at Santiago's Santa María Clinic. His funeral took place with a massive police presence, and mourners took advantage of the occasion to protest the Pinochet regime. Neruda's poetry was outlawed in Chile by the junta until the restoration of democracy in 1990.
  
−
Neruda owned three houses in Chile; today they are all open to the public as museums: La Chascona in Santiago, La Sebastiana in [[Valparaíso]], and [[Casa de Isla Negra]] in Isla Negra, where he and Matilde Urrutia are buried.
+
==Notes==
 +
<references />
  
−
==Trivia==
+
==References==
−
 
+
* Agosín, Marjorie, 1986. ''Pablo Neruda.'' Twayne's World Author's Series.
−
* Pablo Neruda was cited in ''[[The Simpsons]]'' episode "[[Bart Sells His Soul]]".
+
* Anderson, David G., 1987. ''On elevating the commonplace: a structuralist analysis of the "Odas" of Pablo Neruda.''
−
*:Lisa: ''Hmm.  Pablo Neruda said, "Laughter is the language of the soul."''
+
* Bizzarro, Salvatore, 1970. ''Pablo Neruda: all poets the poet.''
−
*:Bart: ''I am familiar with the works of Pablo Neruda.''
+
* Bloom, Harold, 1989. ''Pablo Neruda.'' Modern Critical Views.
−
* ''[[The Sea and the Bells (album)|The Sea and the Bells]]'', an album by [[Rachel's]] released in 1996, derived its title from that of the book by Neruda.
+
* Costa, René de, 1979. ''The poetry of Pablo Neruda.''  
−
* Neruda always wrote in green ink because it was the color of Esperanza (hope).
+
* Durán, Manuel, 1981. ''Earth tones: the poetry of Pablo Neruda.''
−
* The song "[[La Vie Boheme]]" from the musical ''[[Rent (musical)|Rent]]'' contains a line toasting to Neruda.
+
* Eisner, Mark, ed. 2004. ''The Essetial Neruda: Selected Poems.''  City Lights. A compendium of poems published in commemoration of the Centenniel anniversary of his birth.
−
* [[Che Guevara]]'s favorite poet was Neruda. {{fact}}
+
* Feinstein, Adam, 2004. ''Pablo Neruda: A Passion for Life.''  
−
* In the Italian film ''[[Il Postino]]'', Pablo Neruda, portrayed by [[Philippe Noiret]], befriends a postman and inspires in him a love of poetry.
+
* Goodnough, David, 1998. ''Pablo Neruda: Nobel prize-winning poet.''
−
* A  [http://www.dcmemorials.com/index_indiv0000934.htm bust of Neruda] stands on the south side of the Organization of American States building in Washington D.C.  
+
* Hardie, St. Martin, (transl.) 1977. ''Pablo Neruda: Memoirs'' ''(Confieso que he vivido: Memorias)''  Penguin. Twentieth Century Classics.  
−
 
+
* Longo, Teresa, 2002. ''Pablo Neruda and the U.S. culture industry.''
−
==Bibliography==
+
* Méndez-Ramírez, Hugo, 1999. ''Neruda's ekphrastic experience: mural art and Canto general''.
−
 
+
* Neruda, Pablo,  1977. ''Confieso que he vivido: Memorias,'' translated by Hardie St. Martin, Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. ISBN 9374206600
−
* Pablo Neruda: A Passion for Life / Feinstein, Adam., 2004
+
* Nolan, James, 1994. ''Poet-chief: the Native American poetics of Walt Whitman and Pablo Neruda.''
−
* Pablo Neruda and the U.S. culture industry / Longo, Teresa., 2002
+
* Poirot, Luis, 1990. ''Pablo Neruda: absence and presence.''
−
* Windows that open inward: images of Chile / Rogovin, Milton., 1999
+
* Rogovin, Milton, 1999. ''Windows that open inward: images of Chile.''
−
* Neruda's ekphrastic experience: mural art and Canto general / Méndez-Ramírez, Hugo., 1999
+
* Roman, Joe, 1992. ''Pablo Neruda.''
−
* Pablo Neruda: Nobel prize-winning poet / Goodnough, David., 1998
+
* Santí, Enrico Mario, 1982. ''Pablo Neruda, the poetics of prophecy.''
−
* Poet-chief: the Native American poetics of Walt Whitman and Pablo Neruda / Nolan, James., 1994
+
* Teitelboim, Volodia, 1992. ''Neruda: an intimate biography.''
−
* Pablo Neruda / Roman, Joe., 1992
+
−
* Neruda: an intimate biography / Teitelboim, Volodia., 1992
+
== External links ==
−
* Pablo Neruda: absence and presence / Poirot, Luis., 1990
+
All links retrieved November 18, 2022.
−
* Pablo Neruda (Modern Critical Views) / Bloom, Harold., 1989
+
* [https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1971/neruda/facts/ Nobel Prize biography page]  
−
* On elevating the commonplace: a structuralist analysis of the "Odas" of Pablo Neruda / Anderson, David G., 1987
 
−
* Pablo Neruda (Twayne's World Author's Series) / Agosín, Marjorie., 1986
 
−
* Pablo Neruda, the poetics of prophecy / Santí, Enrico Mario., 1982  
 
−
* Earth tones: the poetry of Pablo Neruda / Durán, Manuel., 1981
 
−
* Pablo Neruda: all poets the poet / Bizzarro, Salvatore., 1979
 
−
* The poetry of Pablo Neruda / Costa, René de., 1979
 
−
* Pablo Neruda: Memoirs (Confieso que he vivido: Memorias) / tr. St. Martin, Hardie., 1977
 
−
* The Essential Neruda: Selected Poems. Edited by Mark Eisner. City Lights, 2004.
 
−
 
 
−
=== External links ===
 
−
{{wikiquote}}
 
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{{wikisource author|Pablo Neruda}}
 
−
 
 
−
* [http://nobelprize.org/literature/laureates/1971/neruda-bio.html Nobel Prize bio page]
 
−
* [http://www.neruda.cl Neruda Foundation]
 
−
* [http://web.archive.org/web/20030201231321/http://www.uchile.cl/neruda/ Universidad de Chile: Neruda] (archived on Internet Archive February 1, 2003; original page is no longer available).
 
 
* [http://www.nobelprizes.com/nobel/literature/1971a.html Nobel Prize Internet Archive: Neruda]
 
* [http://www.nobelprizes.com/nobel/literature/1971a.html Nobel Prize Internet Archive: Neruda]
−
* [http://www.poetseers.org/nobel_prize_for_literature/pablo_neruda_%281971%29/pablop/ Selected Poems of Pablo Neruda]
+
* [http://gilbert-wesley-purdy.blogspot.com/2005/10/true-stone-and-epitaph-poetry-of-pablo.html "True Stone and Epitaph: the Poetry of Pablo Neruda"] by Gilbert Wesley Purdy. A full-length book review/essay which includes a biography of Neruda.  
−
* [http://www.biography.com/search/article.jsp?aid=9421737&page=2&search= A&E life story of Neruda]
 
−
* [http://sunsite.dcc.uchile.cl/chile/misc/odas.html Works of Neruda] (some translated into English)
 
−
* [http://gilbert-wesley-purdy.blogspot.com/2005/10/true-stone-and-epitaph-poetry-of-pablo.html "True Stone and Epitaph: the Poetry of Pablo Neruda"] by Gilbert Wesley Purdy. A full-length book review/essay which includes a biography of Neruda.
 
−
* [http://www.lasebastiana-neruda.cl/ La Sebastiana] - one of the homes of Neruda.
 
−
* [http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/07/16/1442233 "Celebrating Chilean Poet Pablo Neruda"], Amy Goodman of ''Democracy Now!'' interviews [[Martín Espada]], poet and professor at the [[University of Massachusetts Amherst]].
 
 
* [http://books.guardian.co.uk/reviews/biography/0,,1268470,00.html "The poet conqueror"], by Kelly Grovier, ''The Guardian'', July 25, 2004 - A review of ''Neruda: A Passion for Life''
 
* [http://books.guardian.co.uk/reviews/biography/0,,1268470,00.html "The poet conqueror"], by Kelly Grovier, ''The Guardian'', July 25, 2004 - A review of ''Neruda: A Passion for Life''
−
* [http://www.yoyita.com/pabloneruda.htm  " Pablo Neruda, His works and some poetry recited by himself"]
+
* [http://www.yoyita.com/pabloneruda.htm  Pablo Neruda], His works and some poetry recited by himself  
−
* [http://www.redpoppy.net/pablo_neruda.php] Red Poppy: non-profit dedicated to spreading Neruda's poetry and furthering his fight for social justice. Home of "The Essential Neruda" and the documentary "Pablo Neruda: The Poet's Calling." Biography. Poems.
 
−
 
 
−
==References==
 
−
<references />
 
  
−
* Adam Feinstein, ''Pablo Neruda: A Passion for Life'', Bloomsbury, 2004. (ISBN 1582344108)
+
{{Nobel Prize in Literature Laureates 1951-1975}}
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* Pablo Neruda, ''Confieso que he vivido: Memorias'', translated by Hardie St. Martin, Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1977. (ISBN 9374206600)
 
  
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[[Category:Art, music, literature, sports and leisure]]
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[[Category:Writers and poets]]
 
{{credit|68972417}}
 
{{credit|68972417}}

Latest revision as of 06:10, 18 November 2022


Pablo Neruda
Pablo Neruda.jpg
Born Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto
July 12 1904(1904-07-12)
Parral, Chile
Died September 23 1973 (aged 69)
Santiago, Chile
Occupation Poet, Diplomat, Political figure
Notable award(s) Nobel Prize in Literature
1971

Pablo Neruda (July 12, 1904 – September 23, 1973) was the pen name of the Chilean poet Ricardo Eliecer Neftalí Reyes Basoalto. Neruda is considered one of the greatest poets of the twentieth century and one of the most influential figures in the history of Latin American literature. Neruda's poetry is renowned for its fantastic imagery and surreal use of language, forming a critical link between the Surrealist movement of early twentieth-century Spain and the Magical Realism of the latter twentieth-century in South America.

Surrealism was an attempt to tap into the unconscious mind, to produce a dream-like work of art that explored truth that was "surreal," or beyond reality. Magical Realism was a literary movement of the latter half of the twentieth century, especially associated with Latin American authors, that introduced certain "magic" or fantasy elements into an otherwise realistic setting.

Like many intellectuals of his era, Neruda was a committed leftist who supported Stalin, only later to be disillusioned by revelations of Stalin's totalitarian machinery of government, Neruda remained a committed communist who supported the socialist Chilean President Salvador Allende shortly before the poet's death. Unlike European socialists, Neruda was affected by the split not only between East and West, but between North and South and the economic inequities that socialism promised to remedy.

Neruda's poetry directly influenced a great number of South American writers, Gabriel Garcia-Marquez, Julio Cortazar, and Isabel Allende among them. Neruda won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1971, a controversial award because of his support of Stalin and his long-standing communist sympathies.

Life

Early years

Pablo Neruda was born in Parral, a city in Linares province, some 350 kilometers south of Santiago, Chile. His father, José del Carmen Reyes Morales, was a poor railway employee; his mother, Rosa Neftalí Basoalto Opazo, was a schoolteacher who died two months after he was born. Neruda and his father soon moved to Temuco, where his father married Trinidad Candia Marverde, the woman with whom he had fathered a child nine years earlier, a boy named Rodolfo. Neruda also grew up with his half-sister Laura, one of his father's children by another woman.

The young Neruda was called "Neftalí", his late mother's middle name. His interest in writing and literature was opposed by his father, but he received encouragement from others, including Gabriela Mistral, who headed the local girls' school at that time, and later won the Nobel Prize for Literature. His first published work was an essay for the local daily newspaper, La Mañana, at the age of 13. By 1920, when he adopted the pseudonym of Pablo Neruda, he was a published author of poetry, prose, and journalism.

Veinte poemas

In the following year (1921), he moved to Santiago to study French at the Universidad de Chile with the intention of becoming a teacher, but soon was devoting himself full time to poetry. In 1923 his first volume of verse, Crepusculario ("Book of Twilights"), was published, followed the next year by Veinte poemas de amor y una canción desesperada ("Twenty Love-Poems and a Song of Despair"), a collection of love poems that were controversial for their explicitness. Both works were critically acclaimed and were translated into many languages. Over the decades, Veinte poemas would sell millions of copies and become Neruda's best-known work. Veinte poemas exemplifies Neruda's style of surreal, almost magical imagery, as well as his graceful use of free, unmetered verse. Here, as an example of this early style, is the beginning of the love-poem entitled Ah the vastness of pines:

Ah vastness of pines, murmur of waves breaking,
slow play of lights, solitary bell,
twilight falling in your eyes, toy doll,
earth-shell, in whom the earth sings!

Neruda's reputation was growing both inside and outside of Chile, but he was plagued by poverty. In 1927, out of desperation, he took an honorary consulship in Rangoon, then a part of colonial Burma. Later, he worked in Ceylon, Jakarta, and Singapore. In Jakarta he met and married his first wife, a tall Dutch bank employee named Maryka Antonieta Hagenaar Vogelzang. While on diplomatic service, Neruda read large amounts of poetry and experimented with many different poetic forms. He wrote the first two volumes of Residencia en la tierra, which included many surreal poems, later to become famous.

Spanish Civil War

After returning to Chile, Neruda was given diplomatic posts in Buenos Aires and then Barcelona, Spain. He later replaced Gabriela Mistral as consul in Madrid, where he became the center of a lively literary circle, befriending such writers as Rafael Alberti, Federico García Lorca, and the Peruvian poet César Vallejo. During this period, Neruda became slowly estranged from his wife and took up with Delia del Carril, an Argentine woman who would eventually become his second wife.

As Spain became engulfed in civil war, Neruda became profoundly politicized for the first time. His experiences of the Spanish Civil War and its aftermath moved him away from individualistic, inwardly-focused work towards works that were socially and politically engaged. Neruda became an ardent communist, and remained so for the rest of his life. The radical leftist politics of his literary friends, as well as that of his second wife were contributing factors, but the most important catalyst was the execution of García Lorca by forces loyal to Francisco Franco.

Following the election in 1938 of President Pedro Aguirre Cerda, whom Neruda supported, he was appointed special consul for Spanish emigration in Paris. There Neruda was given responsibility for what he called "the noblest mission I have ever undertaken": shipping 2,000 Spanish refugees, who had been housed by the French in squalid camps, to Chile on an old boat called the Winnipeg.

Return to Chile

In 1943, following a three-year stint as Consul General to Mexico City, Neruda made a tour of Peru, where he visited Machu Picchu. The austere beauty of the Inca citadel later inspired Alturas de Macchu Picchu, a book-length poem in twelve parts which he completed in 1945, marking a growing awareness and interest in the ancient civilizations of the Americas, themes he was to explore further in Canto General. In this work, Neruda celebrated the achievement of Machu Picchu, but also condemned the slavery which had made it possible. In what is perhaps the most famous part of the poem, Canto XII, Neruda calls upon the dead of many centuries to be born again and to speak through him, to rejuvenate the spirit of South America:

Arise to birth with me, my brother.
Give me your hand out of the depths
sown by your sorrows.
You will not return from these stone fastnesses.
You will not emerge from subterranean time.

Neruda and Stalinism

Bolstered by his experiences in the Spanish Civil War, Neruda, like many left-leaning intellectuals of his generation, came to admire the Soviet Union, partly for the role it played in defeating Nazi Germany (poems Canto a Stalingrado (1942) and 'Nuevo canto de amor a Stalingrado' (1943)). In 1953 Neruda was awarded the Stalin Peace Prize.

Neruda's fervent Stalinism eventually drove a wedge between him and his longtime friend and writer Octavio Paz who commented that, "Neruda became more and more Stalinist, while I became less and less." Although Paz still considered Neruda "the greatest poet of his generation", in an essay on Alexander Solzhenitsyn he wrote that when he "thinks of … Neruda and other famous Stalinist writers I feel the gooseflesh that I get from reading certain passages of Dante’s Inferno. No doubt they began in good faith, but insensibly, commitment by commitment, they saw themselves becoming entangled in a mesh of lies, falsehoods, deceits and perjuries, until they lost their souls."

Neruda later came to rue his support of the Russian leader; after Nikita Khrushchev's famous Secret Speech at the twentieth Party Congress in 1956, in which he denounced the cult of personality that surrounded Stalin and accused him of committing crimes during the Great Purges, Neruda wrote in his memoirs: "I had contributed my share to the personality cult," explaining that "in those days, Stalin seemed to us the conqueror who had crushed Hitler's armies." On a subsequent visit to China in 1957, Neruda would later write: "What has estranged me from the Chinese revolutionary process has not been Mao Tse-tung but Mao Tse-tungism," which he dubbed Mao Tse-Stalinism: "the repetition of a cult of a Socialist deity." However, despite his disillusionment with Stalin, Neruda never lost his essential faith in communism and remained loyal to its ideals.

Political career

On March 4, 1945 Neruda was elected a Communist party senator for the northern provinces of Antofagasta and Tarapacá in the arid and inhospitable Atacama Desert. In 1946, Radical Party presidential candidate Gabriel González Videla asked Neruda to act as his campaign manager. González Videla was supported by a coalition of left-wing parties and Neruda fervently campaigned on his behalf. Once in office, however, González Videla turned against the Communist Party. The breaking point for Senator Neruda was the violent repression of a Communist-led miners' strike in October 1947, in which striking workers were herded into island military prisons and a concentration camp in the town of Pisagua. Neruda's criticism of González Videla culminated in a dramatic speech in the Chilean senate on January 6, 1948 called Yo acuso ("I accuse"), in the course of which he read out the names of the miners and their families who were imprisoned at the concentration camp.

Exile and return

A few weeks later, Neruda went into hiding and he and his wife were smuggled from house to house, hidden by supporters and admirers for the next 13 months. While in hiding, Neruda was removed from office and in September 1948 the Communist Party was banned altogether under the Ley de Defensa Permanente de la Democracia (Law for the Permanent Defense of Democracy) which eliminated over 26,000 people from the electoral registers, thus stripping them of their right to vote. Neruda's life underground ended in March 1949 when he fled over the Andes Mountains to Argentina on horseback. He would dramatically recount his escape from Chile in his Nobel Prize lecture.

Neruda spent the next three years traveling extensively throughout Europe as well as taking trips to India, China, and the Soviet Union. While in Mexico Neruda also published his lengthy epic poem Canto General, a Whitman-inspired catalog of the history, geography, and flora and fauna of South America, accompanied by observations and experiences.

By 1952, the González-Videla dictatorship was on its last legs, weakened by corruption scandals. The Chilean Socialist Party was in the process of nominating Salvador Allende as its candidate for the September 1952 presidential elections and was keen to have the presence of Neruda—by then considered Chile's most prominent left-wing literary figure—to support the campaign.

By that time, Neruda enjoyed worldwide fame as a poet, and his books were being translated into most major languages of the world. He was also vocal on political issues, vigorously denouncing the U.S. during the Cuban Missile Crisis. As one of the most prestigious and outspoken leftwing intellectuals, he also attracted opposition from ideological opponents.

Final years

In 1970, Neruda was nominated as a candidate for the Chilean presidency, but he gave his support to Salvador Allende, who won the election and was inaugurated in 1970 as the first democratically-elected socialist head of state. Shortly thereafter, Allende appointed Neruda the Chilean ambassador to France (lasting from 1970-1972; his final diplomatic posting). After two years Neruda returned to Chile due to failing health.

In 1971, having sought the prize for years, Neruda was finally awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature "for a poetry that with the action of an elemental force brings alive a continent's destiny and dreams." This decision did not come easily, as some of the committee members had not forgotten Neruda's past praise of Stalinist dictatorship. As the Chilean coup of 1973 unfolded, Neruda, then deathly ill from prostate cancer, was devastated by the mounting attacks on the Allende government. The final military coup led by General Augusto Pinochet on September 11 saw Neruda's hopes for a socialist and democratic Chile literally go up in flames. Shortly thereafter, during a search of the house and grounds at Isla Negra by Chilean armed forces at which he was present, Neruda famously remarked:

Look around—there's only one thing of danger to you here—poetry.

Neruda died of heart failure on the evening of September 23, 1973, at Santiago's Santa María Clinic. His funeral took place with a massive police presence, and mourners took advantage of the occasion to protest the Pinochet regime. Neruda's poetry was outlawed in Chile by the junta until the restoration of democracy in 1990.

Notes


References
ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

  • Agosín, Marjorie, 1986. Pablo Neruda. Twayne's World Author's Series.
  • Anderson, David G., 1987. On elevating the commonplace: a structuralist analysis of the "Odas" of Pablo Neruda.
  • Bizzarro, Salvatore, 1970. Pablo Neruda: all poets the poet.
  • Bloom, Harold, 1989. Pablo Neruda. Modern Critical Views.
  • Costa, René de, 1979. The poetry of Pablo Neruda.
  • Durán, Manuel, 1981. Earth tones: the poetry of Pablo Neruda.
  • Eisner, Mark, ed. 2004. The Essetial Neruda: Selected Poems. City Lights. A compendium of poems published in commemoration of the Centenniel anniversary of his birth.
  • Feinstein, Adam, 2004. Pablo Neruda: A Passion for Life.
  • Goodnough, David, 1998. Pablo Neruda: Nobel prize-winning poet.
  • Hardie, St. Martin, (transl.) 1977. Pablo Neruda: Memoirs (Confieso que he vivido: Memorias) Penguin. Twentieth Century Classics.
  • Longo, Teresa, 2002. Pablo Neruda and the U.S. culture industry.
  • Méndez-Ramírez, Hugo, 1999. Neruda's ekphrastic experience: mural art and Canto general.
  • Neruda, Pablo, 1977. Confieso que he vivido: Memorias, translated by Hardie St. Martin, Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. ISBN 9374206600
  • Nolan, James, 1994. Poet-chief: the Native American poetics of Walt Whitman and Pablo Neruda.
  • Poirot, Luis, 1990. Pablo Neruda: absence and presence.
  • Rogovin, Milton, 1999. Windows that open inward: images of Chile.
  • Roman, Joe, 1992. Pablo Neruda.
  • Santí, Enrico Mario, 1982. Pablo Neruda, the poetics of prophecy.
  • Teitelboim, Volodia, 1992. Neruda: an intimate biography.

External links

All links retrieved November 18, 2022.

Nobel Prize in Literature: Laureates (1951-1975)

1951: Pär Lagerkvist | 1952: François Mauriac | 1953: Winston Churchill | 1954: Ernest Hemingway | 1955: Halldór Laxness | 1956: Juan Ramón Jiménez | 1957: Albert Camus | 1958: Boris Pasternak | 1959: Salvatore Quasimodo | 1960: Saint-John Perse | 1961: Ivo Andrić | 1962: John Steinbeck | 1963: Giorgos Seferis | 1964: Jean-Paul Sartre | 1965: Michail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov | 1966: Shmuel Yosef Agnon, Nelly Sachs | 1967: Miguel Ángel Asturias | 1968: Yasunari Kawabata | 1969: Samuel Beckett | 1970: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn | 1971: Pablo Neruda | 1972: Heinrich Böll | 1973: Patrick White | 1974: Eyvind Johnson, Harry Martinson | 1975: Eugenio Montale

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