Pablo Neruda's "Memoirs" is not a comprehensive autobiographical document. It is a personal memoir, recounted as if the author was sitting around a table, with good friends and a bottle of excellent Chilean wine, telling tales of the people, anecdotes and incidents that were so important in his life. "Confieso Que He Vivido," means I confess that I have lived. And Sr. Neruda certainly did that...with zest, zeal and so much talent. The translation by Hardie St. Martin is a good one, but it does not do justice to Neruda's beautiful skill with the Spanish language. He romances the language, like no other, even with his prose.

Neruda was born, the son of a railroad worker, in the then frontier wilderness of Southern Chile in 1904. He led a bohemian lifestyle, dressing in black "like the true poets of the last century," during his university years in Santiago. His shyness, the "kink in the soul,"...especially of women, took him a while to overcome. He describes the people and places of that period with great 'carino' (love). His political ideology began to form at that time also, and politics became an integral part of his writing. The Student Federation, student demonstrations and the subsequent repression, had a great impact on the young intellectual.

Neruda led a rich and fascinating life. World traveled throughout his life, he served as Chilean consul in Burma, Ceylon, and Java. He was the consul in Spain during the Spanish Civil War, and during this time "Nine Love Poems" from "Veinte Poemas de Amor y Una Cancion Desesperada" was published. It was at this time also, that his friend Federico Garcia Lorca was killed. Neruda was present in Paris to organize a worldwide anti-Facist congress of writers that would be held in Madrid. His writing about Spain during the war is heartbreaking. Returning to Chile in 1938, he found a burgeoning Fascist movement in his own beloved land.

I particularly enjoyed his account of the time he spent in Mexico, as consul. He tells of his encounters with the great Mexican painters there.

After returning home, Neruda ran for political office and was elected to Chile's Senate in 1945. He was later removed from his Senate seat after joining the Communist Party.

His friends included: Garcia Lorca, Ehrenburg, Picasso, Siqueiros, Diego Rivera, Octavio Paz, Miguel Angel Asturias, Gandhi, Nehru, Mao, Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, and most sadly, Salvador Allende.

Pablo Neruda's death, just weeks after the brutal murder of Chile's President Allende, is something I will never forget. I was living in Colombia at that time, and remember where I was and what I was doing when I learned of Allende's death, and later heard of Neruda's passing. It called to mind, then and now, my recollections, as a young girl, when President Kennedy's assassination was announced. I always thought Neruda died of a broken heart.

This is an exceptionally good memoir, told with great charm, in a series of vignettes. I highly recommend it, especially to anyone who has read and enjoyed Pablo Neruda's poetry - to my mind some of the most beautiful in the world. It also gives us a glimpse of the politics of the left from the point of view of a Latin American - not the usual perspective, and well worth while.

Although not a fan of autobiographies, Neurda's Memoirs is a must. Memoirs traces his life and adventures from rural Chile to such places as India and pre-world war two Europe. Not only did he visit such wonderful places, but his timing and the role he plays in events is absolutly amazing. Moreover, one gets to see such events through the eye of a poet making Memoirs a rich and stirring read. Reading this not only gives perspective on where Neurda's passion for life came from, but his values and his poetry.

Neruda is one of the best poets ever. Besides, such a marvelous human being, generous, romantic and lovely person. After visiting one of his houses in Santiago, Chile with my boyfriend, I could have a better feeling on how he behaved in is everyday life. This made me admire Neruda much more. Don't you think a Neruda's book is the perfect Valentine's gift? I do!

TIERRA DEL FUEGO has received two major awards: The Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz Award for the best work of fiction by a woman and The Best Book of the Year Award at the Buenos Aires Book Fair.

"This brilliant and beautifully wrought work deserves to become a classic." --The Texas Observer

"TIERRA DEL FUEGO has won two major Latin American awards, and justifiably so: Iparraguirre has crafted an entrancing novel from the skeleton of facts we know about this ghastly episode in English colonial history." --The Bloomsbury Review

"This tale is brilliantly told..." --National Hispanic News

"Iparraguirre has constructed a well-documented novel, with strong humanistic feeling, where personal traits and the twists and turns of the plot are skillfully woven through the genre of a novel blended with a historical chronicle. It is a fresh look at those barbarous ancestors who were destroyed by civilization."
--World Press Review

My name is Gerhard, I live in Germany: this book is just great! Maybe you should extend your rate up to 10 stars. If so, please note, that my ranking is TEN stars for this remarkable novel. I hope that sooner or later this book will be available also in German, to a broader the audiance . Again :what a book. Regards GHE

This fascinating novel is based upon the true (and famous) story of a native of Tierra del Fuego known to the English as "Jemmy Button." He was a Yamana Native American who, along with two other natives, was taken by Captain Robert Fitzroy from the Yamanas' home at the tip of South America and transported aboard the Beagle to England, where the Yamanas were educated and instructed in the ways of British culture and language. They eventually became celebrities, meeting and impressing the royal family.

Button was later returned to Tierra del Fuego by FitzRoy (this time on the voyage of the Beagle that included a young naturalist named Charles Darwin). The Yamanas were left in Tierra del Fuego with materials to construct an English house, as well as utensils and other items of European domestic life; and with the expectation that these properly instructed savages would serve as a vanguard for the expansion of British civilization in their remote land.

Instead, the house-building materials quickly fell to ruin, and the "civilized" Yamanas eventually became involved in an armed conflict with English missionaries. The resulting trial of Button in the Falkland Islands serves as the focus of this story, which is told through the eyes of a fictional Argentine, John William Guevara - a man who carries the name of his criolla mother, rather than his English father.

The distinguished Argentine writer Sylvia Iparraguirre has done far more than weave an interesting historical novel - she has constructed a moving story of the ambiguities of a son's love for his father, of a second-generation immigrant's doomed attraction to the plains of Patagonia, and of the inevitable and irreconcilable conflict between cultures, not merely between those of the Yamana and the British, but also between those cultures and the Argentine.

I highly recommend this book. I read it in the original Spanish. If you want to read the English translation, you should be very careful to order that version. Those who are interested in the topic may also wish to read Chapter 10 of Darwin's "Voyage of the Beagle," and Bruce Chatwin's "In Patagonia," as well as "Savage: the Life and Times of Jemmy Button," by Nick Hazelwood.

la vida vista desde las tinieblas de una mente retorcida, de una casa en decadencia, de una muerte que se retrasa y no llega y que es liberacion de podredumbre de la carne. el autor se enfrenta con la decadencia frente a frente y nos da este cuadro de horror. y esa trama tan bien hecha, esos planes de nuestro querido narrador humberto penaloza, alias el mudito, que nos lleva por la novela por caminos que no sabemos cuando terminan sus suenos y cuando empieza su realidad. el plan de la educacion de boy, su aljamiento del mundo, fantasia, realidad? la vejes, vista como decadencia y como fuerza a la vez, fuerza por las cosas que se saben al traves de los anos, las verguenzas que se tapan, los secretos que se esconden, fuerza para ser el patron de tus patrones, para manipularlos con tu humildad.... y ese nino que va a nacer, debe de ser nuestro, estar al servicio de la decadencia, ser nuestro imbunche, depender de nosotros, estar cosido,no caminar ni hablar, que todo dependa de nosotras, las viejas y ahora que soy una de ellas, ya deje de ser luis mendez el que escribe para ser una de ellas de las viejas que comparten el secreto de la iris mateluna, de la guagua milagrosa que va a nacer y de la que yo tambien sere parte y cuidadora porque quiero ir al cielo cuando se vaya y que me lleve con el y me saque de este martirio de tener que observar a jeronimo y ser su lacayo, estar a su servicio. dejare de ser una presencia sobre la que los ojos resbalan para ser una vieja. bueno al menos se que sere alguien y no como mi padre un ser simple admirando la belleza desde lejos, yo estare del otro lado de las cosas bellas, pero no en la mediocridad de sus ojos melancolicos que me miran y miran las vitrinas de lo que no puede comprar y de lo que jamas podra ser.... humberto penaloza.

LUIS MENDEZ luismendez@codetel.net.do

This book is a true masterpiece into hallucinatory writing. Donoso captures the essence of classical latin american magical realism while flickering between narratives and schizophrenia. A truely touching novel, full of life, imagery, love and disgust. A masterpiece.

Dalton's poetry is intense, and exudes revolution in every verse. Knowing a history of the poet's life and struggle, you get a greater feel and appreciation for all his work. His pain, love, and hate all mixed together delivers the most powerful poetry I've ever read. I enjoyed this book immensely, and recommend it to all of those that are a rebel at heart.

In Dalton's words you can hear his pain, loss and anger; but it's his love and romantic vision that you take away. I tresure this book and it stands as my most read book.

Este libro es muy bueno. Hace sentir en carne propia el fracaso en que cae este profesor de literatura autoexiliado (y muy marcado con sus vivencias durante el Golpe de Estado) con aires de escritor... pero solo aire... solo aspiraciones. En realidad todos esperamos ser más de lo que somos, y nos mortificamos cuando sentimos que estamos lejos, y no aceptamos que no lo somos... Más que en hechos, esta obra se basa en pensamientos. Mientras el mundo da una vuelta, la cabeza de Julio Méndez da mil... y "su mundo", también.