Today I can write
Pablo Neruda
Pablo Neruda (/nəˈruːdə/ nə-ROO-də;[1] Spanish pronunciation: [ˈpaβlo neˈɾuða] ⓘ; born
Ricardo Eliécer Neftalí Reyes Basoalto; 12 July 1904 – 23 September 1973) was a Chilean
poet-diplomat and politician who won the 1971 Nobel Prize in Literature.[2] Neruda
became known as a poet when he was 13 years old and wrote in a variety of styles,
including surrealist poems, historical epics, political manifestos, a prose autobiography,
and passionate love poems such as the ones in his collection Twenty Love Poems and a
Song of Despair (1924).
Born:--Ricardo Eliécer Neftalí Reyes Basoalto,12 July 1904,Parral, Maule Region, Chile
Died:--23 September 1973 (aged 69),Santiago, Chile
Occupations:--
Poet ,diplomat ,politician
Political party:--Communist
Spouses:--Marijke Antonieta Hagenaar Vogelzang(m. 1930; div. 1942)
Delia del Carrill(m. 1943; div. 1955)
Matilde Urrutia Cerda(m. 1966)
Children:-- 1
Awards:--International Peace Prize (1950)
Stalin Peace Prize (1953)
Nobel Prize in Literature (1971)
Neruda occupied many diplomatic positions in various countries during his lifetime and
served a term as a senator for the Chilean Communist Party. When President Gabriel
González Videla outlawed communism in Chile in 1948, a warrant was issued for Neruda’s
arrest. Friends hid him for months in the basement of a house in the port city of Valparaíso,
and in 1949, he escaped through a mountain pass near Maihue Lake into Argentina; he
would not return to Chile for more than three years. He was a close advisor to Chile's
, socialist president Salvador Allende, and when he got back to Chile after accepting his
Nobel Prize in Stockholm, Allende invited him to read at the Estadio Nacional before 70,000
people.
Neruda died at his home in Isla Negra on 23 September 1973, just hours after leaving the
hospital. Although it was long reported that he died of heart failure, the interior ministry of
the Chilean government issued a statement in 2015 acknowledging a ministry document
indicating the government’s official position that “it was clearly possible and highly likely”
that Neruda was killed as a result of “the intervention of third parties”.[5] However, an
international forensic test conducted in 2013 rejected allegations that he was poisoned. It
was concluded that he had been suffering from prostate cancer.[6][7] In 2023, after
forensics testing, it was discovered that the bacterium Clostridium botulinum, some
strains of which can produce toxins, was present in some of his body.[8][9] However, the
family’s claim that the forensic test proved he was poisoned was called into question, as it
was not determined that the bacteria in him was even harmful.
Neruda is often considered the national poet of Chile, and his works have been popular
and influential worldwide. The Colombian novelist Gabriel García Márquez once called him
“the greatest poet of the 20th century in any language”,[11] and the critic Harold Bloom
included Neruda as one of the writers central to the Western tradition in his book The
Western Canon.
Introduction
The Chilean poet Pablo Neruda included “Tonight I can write the saddest lines,” a.k.a.
“Poem 20,” in his collection Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair (Veinte poemas de
amor y una cancion desesperada). First published in 1924, when Neruda was just 19 years
old, the collection charts the course of love, lust, and heartbreak. In this particular poem
(the title of which actually just refers to its first line), the speaker confronts the loneliness,
pain, and confusion of a break-up. Without his beloved by his side, the starry night seems
cold and foreboding to the speaker, who struggles to accept that a love that once felt
endless love has, in fact, ended for good—leaving the speaker with no company apart from
the painful memory of what he’s lost.
Original text of the poem
I can write the saddest poetry ever tonight.
Pablo Neruda
Pablo Neruda (/nəˈruːdə/ nə-ROO-də;[1] Spanish pronunciation: [ˈpaβlo neˈɾuða] ⓘ; born
Ricardo Eliécer Neftalí Reyes Basoalto; 12 July 1904 – 23 September 1973) was a Chilean
poet-diplomat and politician who won the 1971 Nobel Prize in Literature.[2] Neruda
became known as a poet when he was 13 years old and wrote in a variety of styles,
including surrealist poems, historical epics, political manifestos, a prose autobiography,
and passionate love poems such as the ones in his collection Twenty Love Poems and a
Song of Despair (1924).
Born:--Ricardo Eliécer Neftalí Reyes Basoalto,12 July 1904,Parral, Maule Region, Chile
Died:--23 September 1973 (aged 69),Santiago, Chile
Occupations:--
Poet ,diplomat ,politician
Political party:--Communist
Spouses:--Marijke Antonieta Hagenaar Vogelzang(m. 1930; div. 1942)
Delia del Carrill(m. 1943; div. 1955)
Matilde Urrutia Cerda(m. 1966)
Children:-- 1
Awards:--International Peace Prize (1950)
Stalin Peace Prize (1953)
Nobel Prize in Literature (1971)
Neruda occupied many diplomatic positions in various countries during his lifetime and
served a term as a senator for the Chilean Communist Party. When President Gabriel
González Videla outlawed communism in Chile in 1948, a warrant was issued for Neruda’s
arrest. Friends hid him for months in the basement of a house in the port city of Valparaíso,
and in 1949, he escaped through a mountain pass near Maihue Lake into Argentina; he
would not return to Chile for more than three years. He was a close advisor to Chile's
, socialist president Salvador Allende, and when he got back to Chile after accepting his
Nobel Prize in Stockholm, Allende invited him to read at the Estadio Nacional before 70,000
people.
Neruda died at his home in Isla Negra on 23 September 1973, just hours after leaving the
hospital. Although it was long reported that he died of heart failure, the interior ministry of
the Chilean government issued a statement in 2015 acknowledging a ministry document
indicating the government’s official position that “it was clearly possible and highly likely”
that Neruda was killed as a result of “the intervention of third parties”.[5] However, an
international forensic test conducted in 2013 rejected allegations that he was poisoned. It
was concluded that he had been suffering from prostate cancer.[6][7] In 2023, after
forensics testing, it was discovered that the bacterium Clostridium botulinum, some
strains of which can produce toxins, was present in some of his body.[8][9] However, the
family’s claim that the forensic test proved he was poisoned was called into question, as it
was not determined that the bacteria in him was even harmful.
Neruda is often considered the national poet of Chile, and his works have been popular
and influential worldwide. The Colombian novelist Gabriel García Márquez once called him
“the greatest poet of the 20th century in any language”,[11] and the critic Harold Bloom
included Neruda as one of the writers central to the Western tradition in his book The
Western Canon.
Introduction
The Chilean poet Pablo Neruda included “Tonight I can write the saddest lines,” a.k.a.
“Poem 20,” in his collection Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair (Veinte poemas de
amor y una cancion desesperada). First published in 1924, when Neruda was just 19 years
old, the collection charts the course of love, lust, and heartbreak. In this particular poem
(the title of which actually just refers to its first line), the speaker confronts the loneliness,
pain, and confusion of a break-up. Without his beloved by his side, the starry night seems
cold and foreboding to the speaker, who struggles to accept that a love that once felt
endless love has, in fact, ended for good—leaving the speaker with no company apart from
the painful memory of what he’s lost.
Original text of the poem
I can write the saddest poetry ever tonight.
