Valdivia

by Galo Ghigliotto

Poetry. Latino/Latina Studies. Translated from the Spanish by Daniel Borzutzky. What spirits lurk beneath the surface of Valdivia's Calle-Calle River or loiter under the arches of the Pedro de Valdivia Bridge in southern Chile? Galo Ghigliotto's VALDIVIA answers these questions and others by intertwining memories of disaster and tragedy personal, political, and natural to recreate and relive each anew in unforgettably vivid poetry. Set in a city rich with history and mythology, VALDIVIA reveals a Necropastoral Chile by evoking the threatening natural environment that bore the devastation of the most powerful earthquake on record and the state-sponsored violence of recent Chilean political history. In his introduction to the translation, Ghigliotto, a student of the great Chilean poet Raul Zurita, states, "Over time, I discovered that there are things in this book that I did not know were there, but there they are. I am there, yes. VALDIVIA is, too, but Chile is there as well, and the emblem of Chile is violence. [.] It is a tragic country, where legends exist because there is always something dark and evil creating them somewhere." With Ghigliotto's VALDIVIA, Daniel Borzutzky continues the urgent and necessary work of translating contemporary Chilean poets as he deftly Englishes Ghiglotto's verses, full of the shadowy figures and images of legend that plague the city and the psychological memoryscapes that haunt the poet.

Daniel Borzutzky's most recent books include THE PERFORMANCE OF BECOMING HUMAN (Brooklyn Arts Press, 2016), which is a finalist for the 2016 National Book Award; Memories of my Overdevelopment (2015); IN THE MURMURS OF THE ROTTEN CARCASS ECONOMY (Nightboat Books, 2015); and THE BOOK OF INTERFERING BODIES (Nightboat Books, 2011). His translation of Raul Zurita's THE COUNTRY OF PLANKS (2015) was nominated for the 2016 National Translation Award. He has translated Zurita's SONG FOR HIS DISAPPEARED LOVE (Action Books, 2010), and Jaime Luis Huenun's PORT TRAKL (Action Books, 2008). His work has been supported by the Illinois Arts Council, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Pen/Heim Translation Fund. He lives in Chicago."

Genres: Poetry

130 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2006

About the author

Galo Ghigliotto (Valdivia, Chile, 1977) es escritor, traductor, editor y gestor cultural.

Ha publicado las novelas El museo de la bruma (2019, Premio Mejores Obras Literarias 2020; Candaya, 2026) y Matar al Mandinga (2016, Premio Juegos Literarios Gabriela Mistral); los libros de cuentos Su cadáver avanza hacia el mar (2026) y A cada rato el fin del mundo (2013); y los libros de poesía Monosúper (2016), Aeropuerto (2009), Bonnie&Clyde (2007) y Valdivia (2006), traducido al francés y al inglés, traducción que obtuvo el Premio National Translation Award 2007.

Ha traducido del francés y del inglés a autores como Annie Ernaux, Antonin Artaud, Violette Ailhaud y Daniel Borzutzky.

Es fundador de Editorial Cuneta y de La Furia del Libro, feria de editoriales independientes de Santiago de Chile.

(fuente: Editorial Candaya)

Reviews

[Emilia Macchi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Yo no leo mucha poesía y fue ideal, porque hay cierto hilo argumental. Es un poemario fantasmal que muestra un lado oscuro de Valdivia, en contraposición a la versión de ciudad turística de grandes caudales y áreas verdes. Se puede mirar como el relato de un padre violento o la colonización de un territorio. Para leerlo en una tarde.

[Katherine Hoch · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gratamente sorprendida con este poemario porque destruye el estereotipo que tiene el santiaguino sobre Valdivia. Me encantó ese tono de horror que se esconde en cada poema. También me gustó cómo esa sensación tenebrosa va armando el relato del libro. La voz es la de un niño que es espectador de la violencia familiar y eso me pareció brutal y muy real.

[Eric · Rating 5 out of 5]

i also had children in death father
i had seen them in dreams
and they were all beautiful like you and me holding hands
on the way to the park that would move around
as your silhouette mutated

i have shards of life breathing all over me
now it is water
now it is the name of the city of Valdivia
now this cloud is about to rain on a mirror

[Benjamin Niespodziany · Rating 5 out of 5]

A dizzying, spellbinding fable thrown out of order. It feels like a never ending fever dream looping over and over. Death and drowning and domestic violence and beauty all encircle this city in southern Chile, where history and memory melt with the extraordinary, with the surreal.

[Cody Stetzel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Valdivia is a ferocious work, hallucinatory and doubling back on its distrusting images. Ghigliotto finds tremendous success with the return, the re-examination, the re-assertion of meaning in the wake of necessary imaginative escapes throughout such immense trauma.

[World Literature Today]

This book was featured in the Nota Benes section of the March 2017 issue of World Literature Today Magazine.

https://www.worldliteraturetoday.org/...