Connecting Lines: New Poetry from Mexico

by Forrest Gander (Translator), Hernán Lara Zavala (Preface by)

Through a partnership to promote wider access to literary voices of Mexican artists in the United States and American writers in Mexico, the National Endowment for the Arts, the United States Embassy in Mexico, and Mexico’s National Fund for Culture and the Arts have joined together to support a proposed three-year program of anthology publication and public outreach activities. In the first year, Sarabande has been named publisher of the poetry anthologies. “We are pleased to introduce readers to the best of contemporary Mexican and American poetry through these comprehensive bilingual anthologies,” states National Endowment for the Arts Chairman Dana Gioia. “I believe they will quickly become essential volumes for poetry lovers and grant new insight into both cultures.” Contributors David Huerta, Alberto Blanco, Coral Bracho, Ricardo Castillo, Vicente Quirarte, Rafael Vargas, Alicia Garcia Bergua, Fabio Morábito, Silvia Tomasa Rivera, Myriam Moscona, and more.

Genres: Poetry

275 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 2006

About the author

Born in the Mojave Desert, Forrest Gander grew up in Virginia and spent significant periods in San Francisco, Dolores Hidalgo (Mexico), and Eureka Springs, Arkansas before moving to Rhode Island. He holds degrees in literature and in geology, a subject that recurs in his writing and for which his work has been connected to ecological poetics.

Collaboration has been an important engagement for Gander who, over the years, has worked with artists such as Ann Hamilton, Sally Mann, Eiko & Koma, Lucas Foglia, Ashwini Bhat, Richard Hirsch & Michael Rogers. He also translates extensively and has edited several anthologies of contemporary poetry from Latin America, Spain, and Japan.

He writes across the genres. A recent project with the Chilean poet Raul Zurita is Pinholes in the Night Essential Poems from Latin America. Other titles by Gander include The Trace, a novel set on the border with Mexico; Fungus Skull Eye Wing Selected Poems of Alfonso D'Aquino, translations; and Redstart an Ecological Poetics, essays and poems written with John Kinsella. Gander's 2011 book of poems, Core Samples from the World, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award.

Reviews

[Cayden Clark-Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is fantastic.

Some of my favorite poems:

Desde los corrales de la noche (From the Night's Stockyards) by Antonio Deltoro

Poema visto en el ventilador de un motel (Poem Seen on a Motel Fan) by Alberto Blanco

Después tu cuerpo fue la calle en calma (Later Your Body Was the Calm Street) by Vincente Quirarte

Serías capaz (You Could) and
Te vi en el Parque (I Saw You in the Park)
by Silvia Tomasa Rivera

Un árbol (A tree) by Juan Domingo Argüelles

Mensaje del que duda (Doubtful Message) by Luis Vincente de Aguinaga

The Moon Ain't Nothing but a Broken Dish by Luis Felipe Fabre

Tanagra by Alfonso D'Aquino

Feu Rouge by Paloma Villegas

[Fátima · Rating 4 out of 5]

En poemario que refleja la escencia de cada autor en el contexto de la sociedad mexicana.
El acomodo de los textos suele confundir sobre la extensión de cada poema, por eso cuatro estrellas.