Pablo Neruda Love Poems: Unpublished Poems Are Discovered 40 Years After His Death
Chilean Nobel laureate Pablo Neruda died 40 years ago, but now he lives again, as over 20 more of his poems were discovered last week.
Neruda is known for his love poems, so it should come as no surprise that some of these newly discovered works are about love. Both the Pablo Neruda Foundation in Chile and Neruda's publisher, Barcelona-based Seix Barral, are thrilled about the find.
The poems were discovered during the cataloging of his manuscripts. They were in a bundle of boxed manuscripts. Experts have authenticated the poems, the BBC reported. The new poems date to between the 1950s and '60s. Neruda died in 1973. Six of the poems are about love, the BBC said.
Neruda is best known for his collection "Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair" and is also known for his communist views.
It was during the '50s and '60s that Neruda wrote some of his widely popular works, including "The Captain's Verses" and "100 Love Sonnets."
Spanish wire service EFE called the poems "the most significant unpublished material written by the poet," the Los Angeles Times reported. The poems are of "extraordinary quality," The Guardian reported his publisher says, and Seix Barral said they were "the most important discovery in Spanish letters in recent years."
One of the authenticators for Neruda's work, poet and academic Pere Gimferrer, said these new poems showcase Neruda's gift of "imaginative power and ... erotic and romantic passion."
Madrid newspaper El Pais published an excerpt from one of the poems: "Reposa tu pura cadera y el arco de flechas mojadas / extiende en la noche los pétalos que forman tu forma," translated into English as, "Your pure hip rests and the bow of wet arrows / stretches in the night the petals that form your shape."
This is not the first time since he died that more of Neruda's work has been discovered. In 1980, a collection of poems from his youth was found, the Los Angeles Times reported.
Do not expect to see these recent discoveries published in English soon. Seix Barral will publish them in Latin America this year and in Spain in 2015. No English translation has been announced.
The poems are expected to be published around the time of the 110th anniversary of Neruda's birth and the 90th anniversary of the publication of "Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair," the BBC reported.
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