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105 Greatest Living Authors Present the World's Best Stories, Humor, Drama, Biography, History, Essays, Poetry

By: Whit Burnett | Book details

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Page 355
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PABLO NERUDA

SANTIAGO, CHILE

Among my works, I have chosen a poem I am including, Alturas de Macchu Picchu*which I estimate the most representative of my last production. It has not yet been included in any of my books. First appeared in Expressión ( 1947), a literary magazine of Buenos Aires, and then published in Confluences ( 1947), a literary magazine of Paris (translated into French by Roger Callois); is almost an unknown piece of my work among a big portion of my readers. This poem represents a tendency in my literary development to confine and devote my efforts to my continent, America, its land, people and culture. This tendency is visible in all of my poems which have appeared in several Latin American periodicals lately. Part of them are ready to be printed by Editorial Losada of Buenos Aires, this year, under the name of Canto General.

PABLO NERUDA

[The following translation, specially prepared for THE WORLD'S BEST, is the first English rendering of Alturas de Macchu Picchu.]

____________________
*
Translator's Note: The ancient fortress city of Macchu Picchu, cradle of the Inca Empire, is located more than 12,000 feet above sea-level in the most inaccessible corner of the Peruvian Andes. Built some 3000 years B. C., this oldest American city was lost for many centuries before it was uncovered and excavated by Hiram Bingham in 1912. Although the roofs, which were made of thatch, are gone, the city is still almost intact: a terraced city of narrow streets, rock-hewn stairways (over a hundred of them, some of more than 150 steps), walls (some of them curved) of granite blocks, beautifully fitted together, a temple with sundial, monolithic lintels, windows, hanging gardens. From the excavations of Macchu Picchu the silver rings, bronze knives, bone needles, exquisite terra cotta and pieces of pottery with complex decorations bear eloquent testimony to the advanced techniques and aesthetic expressions of this early Inca civilization. Further details are given in Hiram Bingham's articles in The National Geographic Magazine April 1913, February 1915 and May 1916, and in his book Lost City of the Incas( 1948).

In Neruda's long quest for the essence of America, it is fitting that he should be inspired by these ruins. After the philosophical introduction, the poet climbs up to Macchu Picchu (Stanza VI) and contemplates the geology, geography and history of the Inca city, and reflects upon man's cruelty to man and the meaning of "eternal" verities.

-355-

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