ENG 209
2 December 2010
Pablo Neruda: Political Activist and Citizen of the Earth
Pablo Neruda’s passion for justice and the social relevance of his poetry has made him one of the most celebrated and beloved poets of Latin-America. Despite his far left political views, he is regarded as one of the giants of the twentieth century literature. Neruda personifies the real spirit of the Latin-American nations and the complexity of their nature. His curiosity about life and his unending desire for social justice has brought him only many years of political rejection and exile. To his opponents, he had only one poetic objection in regards to the meaning of human’s existence: “stifle one half of existence’s fullness like fish in an alien limit of ocean” (Neruda, 97), and Neruda made sure he would explore this ocean of life in full length and depth.
In his poetry, Neruda explores the innermost part of the muddled nature of the human existence with its moral downfall, when after war there will be: “victory with no survivors” (wisdom portal.com), thus no one can win in any type of war. His political and social conscience obligated him to write poems about very unpopular political occurrences, such as mass murders of innocent people, described as “a moment/ spanning the passageways, meeting/ the newly killed voices” (Neruda, 89), while at the same time the dictators, who’ve committed this atrocities are conversing in their “palace” with a “financial satrap” holding “wineglasses”, seemingly undisturbed by the bloodshed (Neruda, p.89). In an oppressive dictatorship regimen, regardless of the country, there will be innocent victims of whom Neruda will speak about through his poetry. In the poem “A Few Things Explained”, Neruda is juxtaposing his house explosion of geraniums with “wild pandemonium/ of fingers and feet overflowing the streets” (Neruda, 55) with the “quintessence” of life, namely the children of Spain. In his work Neruda addressed many...