Neruda, Pablo

New York. 1983. Farrar Straus Giroux. Uncorrected Page Proof. Very Good in Wrappers. 0374229945. Translated from the Spanish by Margaret Sayers Peden. 389 pages. paperback. Jacket design by Antonio Frasconi. keywords: Literature Translated Poetry Chile Latin America. FROM THE PUBLISHER - In his poetry, Pablo Neruda periodically shed his poetic skin to assume new forms. More than one critic has alluded to this ‘protean ability to be always in the vanguard of change.' The prose pieces in this posthumous collection reflect that versatility, that enormous hunger for new modes of expression, new adventures, new challenges. Spanning a lifetime, these passions and impressions range from early prose poems anticipating Neruda's first collection of poetry to the speech he delivered, two years before his death, on the occasion of his acceptance of the Nobel Prize. PASSIONS AND IMPRESSIONS is both a sequel to and an enlargement on Neruda's Memoirs. It records a lifetime of travel, of friendships and enmities, of exile and homecoming, loss and discovery, of history both public and personal. In view of Neruda's reputation as a political activist, his courageous pronouncement against President Gonzalez Videla of Chile-his ‘I Accuse' speech ringing with echoes of Zola's famous letter in the Dreyfus affair -is of particular interest. Animating this collection is Neruda's ability to recapture the past, to bring to us in vivid detail the people and places and events of his remarkable life: reminiscences of friends and lovers, exotic birds and Chilean bandits, colorful depictions of Far East seaports, jungle temples, a room in Montmartre, the cities and countryside of South America. But the overriding impression is of Neruda's love for Chile-for his long, narrow native land at ‘the far ends of the earth,' for its citizens, its flora and fauna, its national identity. His abiding devotion pervades these notes on a life fully lived. inventory #17888 ISBN: 0374229945.