{"id":120867,"date":"2018-01-29T09:00:16","date_gmt":"2018-01-29T14:00:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=120867"},"modified":"2018-01-31T15:59:56","modified_gmt":"2018-01-31T20:59:56","slug":"nicanor-parra-alpha-male-poet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/01\/29\/nicanor-parra-alpha-male-poet\/","title":{"rendered":"Nicanor Parra, the Alpha-Male Poet"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nicanor Parra died last week at\u00a0the age of\u00a0a hundred three. Here, David Unger remembers a collaboration with\u00a0Parra that seemed doomed from the start.\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n

<\/a>

Nicanor Parra. Photo: Fundaci\u00f3n Iberoamericana<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

I first began translating the Chilean poet Nicanor Parra in 1973, on the recommendation of Frank MacShane, the professor of my graduate translation course at Columbia University. I bought Obra gruesa<\/em>, an anthology of Parra\u2019s poetry published by Chile\u2019s Editorial Universitaria at the Las Americas bookstore in Union Square. Back then, there were\u00a0four Spanish-language bookstores on or around Fourteenth\u00a0Street in Manhattan. Later, I picked up Poems and Anti-Poems<\/em> and Emergency Poems<\/em>, two New Directions collections of Parra\u2019s work. At the time, I was a serious silk-scarf\/whiskey-breath poet, best buddies with classmate Frank Lima, a Rimbaud-like, jail-schooled poet.<\/p>\n

I devoured these three Parra books, then went about looking for poems that had not been translated into English. I found \u201c\u00daltimo\u00a0brindis,\u201d a cynical mathematical poem that exemplified Parra\u2019s antipoetry philosophy, and translated it as \u201cThe Final Toast.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Like it or not
\nWe\u2019re given only three choices:
\nThe past, the present and the future.<\/p>\n

And not even three
\nFor the philosopher tells us
\nThe past has passed
\nIt\u2019s ours only in memory:
\nFrom the rose stripped of her petals
\nAnother petal can\u2019t be drawn.<\/p>\n

There are only two cards
\nIn the deck:
\nThe present and the future.<\/p>\n

And not even two
\nBecause everyone knows
\nThat the present doesn\u2019t exist
\nBut in the way it becomes the past
\nAnd that\u2019s passed\u2026
\nLike youth.<\/p>\n

To make a long story short
\nWe\u2019re being left only with the future:
\nI make a toast
\nFor that day which never comes
\nBut is the only thing
\nReally left in our control.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

After workshopping it in class, I sent my translation to The Massachusetts Review<\/em>, a journal I’d long admired. About a week later, I received a postcard from the editor, Jules Chametzky, saying that the poem had bowled over the editorial staff. Jules wanted to publish it on the back cover of their very next issue. Would I give them permission? Moreover, I would be paid fifteen smackers.<\/p>\n

Early success, at twenty-two, got my head spinning about the lures of translation.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

In 1978, Jonathan Cohen, Jonathan Felstiner, and I translated fellow Chilean Enrique Lihn\u2019s The Dark Room and Other Poems<\/em> for New Directions; in 1982, Lewis Hyde and I cotranslated the Nobelist Vicente Aleixandre\u2019s World Alone<\/em> for Penmaen Press. When New Directions signed Parra to a new book, I was tapped to be the editor.<\/p>\n

From the start, Parra was deeply unhappy.\u00a0 He had expected Allen Ginsberg, with whom he had recently read at the Americas Society, to edit him, though Ginsberg hardly spoke Spanish and wasn\u2019t at all interested in the task. Moreover, I was an unknown Guatemalan American poet thirty-six years his junior.<\/p>\n

I wish I could say that Nicanor and I worked hand and glove. I truly loved his poetry, its anarchic, humorously irreverent style, the lack of pomposity and literary flourish. Like a good poet, according to T. S. Eliot\u2019s dictum, I stole rather than imitated him in my own verse. But as his English editor, Nicanor tolerated me, at best, like a recurring hacking cough. I was never able to surmount his disappointment that I was not Allen Ginsberg. At the time, Parra was living on 110th\u00a0Street in Manhattan with his artist daughter Catalina, and I was with my family on 113th\u00a0Street. Nicanor was a phone call or a short hop away. On the phone, he was always floaty and reticent; whenever I visited him in Catalina\u2019s apartment to talk about my ideas for the book, he would meet me dressed in pajamas, his gray hair flying like straw every which way on his head. He was eternally unshaven and only wanted to talk about his translation of Hamlet<\/em>, especially the famous \u201cTo be or not to be\u201d soliloquy.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Ser o no ser<\/em>
\n He aqu\u00ed el dilema<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Two of these visits made me realize his slovenly dress was done a prop\u00f3sito<\/em>\u2014on purpose, a way to show his disdain without actually being rude. He was forever the trickster and reliably unconventional, but always with a motive. No wonder his poetry made readers feel they were being shot by a revolver point-blank in the face: the loud popping sound, followed by a white flag of surrender slinking comically out of the muzzle.<\/p>\n

As editor, I wanted to honor his previous translators by including much of their previously published material. Nonetheless, I wanted revisions where I felt the translators had strayed, been inaccurate or wordy. \u00a0For example, in their translation of \u201cThe\u00a0Individual\u2019s Soliloquy,\u201d Ginsberg and Ferlinghetti had left out two lines of the Spanish. I made multiple suggestions to Miller Williams and W. S. Merwin for alternate readings of some passages; Williams accepted them all, and Merwin and I shadowboxed a bit before reaching a compromise. Denise Levertov absolutely refused to give me permission to republish her translation, in protest of Parra shaking Pat Nixon\u2019s hand at the White House during the Vietnam War and of his unwillingness to save his imprisoned nephew Angel, son of the singer-composer Violeta Parra, after Pinochet\u2019s coup in Chile. Her letter was venomous.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

As I went about preparing my manuscript, Parra canceled meetings and refused to answer queries, which I sent by mail across the three blocks that separated us. The straw that broke the camel\u2019s back was when I assigned \u201cThe Man He Imagined,\u201d a wonderful lyric poem about a lonely, heartbroken man who lives in a mansion, to Edith Grossman, a translator just hitting her stride and the author of The Antipoetry of Nicanor Parra<\/em>. Behind my back, Nicanor had sent this same poem to at least four other translators. I asked him why he had done that. He said translation should be a horse race and he should be able to pick the winner. He was very confident in his English, which I found poor, and the arrogance of this answer kind of stuck in my craw.<\/p>\n

I told Nicanor that I had to meet him at once to discuss my role as editor. This meeting took place at the Hungarian Pastry Shop across from St. John the Divine near Columbia University. I don\u2019t recall what he wore, but I\u2019m sure he dressed for the occasion, expecting me to throw in the towel.<\/p>\n

Heart pounding, I told him that as editor, I could not tolerate this kind of subterfuge. Translation is a painstaking art, and I couldn\u2019t have celebrated translators, friends of mine, competing with each other like horses. Nicanor just sat there and listened without drinking his tea. From time to time, he pursed his lips and looked blank, ignoring my eyes and glancing at the nearby coeds. Without saying another word, he suddenly got up and left. He flew back to Chile perhaps a week later. He refused to answer any of my calls or letters. I suspected that few people had ever stood up to him before\u2014his silence was his way of underscoring my unimportance and his authority. After all, Nicanor was an alpha male.<\/p>\n

\u00a0*<\/p>\n

It isn\u2019t easy for me to feel sad
\nTo be honest
\nEven skulls make me laugh.
\nThe poet asleep on the cross
\nGreets you with tears of blood.<\/p>\n

\u2014from \u201cLetters from a Poet Who Sleeps in a Chair\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

I continued working on my manuscript, revising old translations, commissioning others. I submitted Antipoems: New and Selected<\/em> to my editor Frederick Martin, who sent it on to Parra for his final revisions. Parra was an inveterate tinkerer; it was difficult for him to send a poem or his translation of Hamlet <\/em>on its way. He never answered Martin, or any of his Chilean interlocutors, even when told that the book would go to press without his final edits if he didn\u2019t respond by a certain date.<\/p>\n

The book was published in 1985 with a wonderful introduction by Frank MacShane. I heard from several Chilean friends that Nicanor hated the book because I had published translations he was still working to perfect. The coup de gr\u00e2ce, however, was the New Directions cover, which he hadn\u2019t authorized; he said, with great disdain, that Layle Silbert\u2019s photo made him look like a monkey.<\/p>\n

I can only accept beauty
\nUgliness is something I find painful<\/p>\n

\u2014from \u201cLetters from a Poet Who Sleeps in a Chair\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

For the next twenty years, Parra never mentioned the book I had edited. Whenever he submitted his bio for prizes, readings, and publications, it was as if it never existed.<\/p>\n

\u00a0*<\/p>\n

Parra and I didn\u2019t communicate again for six years. In 1991, he was awarded the first Juan Rulfo Prize by the Guadalajara International Book Fair in early September. It was a huge honor, and worth a hundred thousand dollars. I was covering the fair for Publishers Weekly<\/em> and got New Directions to send twenty-five copies of my bilingual Antipoems <\/em>to sell in Guadalajara. Two days before the prize was bestowed upon him, I ran into Nicanor in the aisles of the fair. Curiously enough, he embraced me happily and said, \u201cQu\u00e9 hay de tu vida?,\u201d a common Chilean greeting. I mumbled something incoherent, I\u2019m sure.<\/p>\n

Was I simply a familiar face to Nicanor, or had he forgiven me?<\/p>\n

I congratulated him, and he clapped my back several times. Then he said that he thought that his daughter Catalina would want to be there with him for the ceremony two days away. Would I call her in New York and see if she wanted to fly down? \u201cTell her that I\u2019ll pay for her ticket,\u201d he said cavalierly.<\/p>\n

I thought this request odd, since he had known about the award for over two months, but the request illustrated his restrained narcissism. I truly wanted to make amends, but I didn\u2019t want to do his bidding for him. In the end, I brought him to the press office, where he could use one of the phones to call her for free.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m pretty sure Catalina didn\u2019t come (at least, I didn\u2019t see her). Though Nicanor and I continued to have many friends in common\u2014the Chilean novelists Carlos Franz and Arturo Fontaine, the translator Edith Grossman\u2014we never again crossed paths. This was unfortunate because I truly loved many of his poems and felt that along with his fellow Chilean poets Pablo Neruda and Gabriela Mistral, he was a true trailblazer.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 *<\/p>\n

Sure\u2014rest in peace
\nbut what about the damp?
\nand the moss?
\nand the weight of the tombstone?
\nand the drunken gravediggers?
\nand the people who steal the flowerpots?
\nand the rats gnawing at the coffins?
\nand the damned worms
\ncrawling in everywhere
\nthey make death impossible for us
\nor do you really think
\nwe don\u2019t know what\u2019s going on\u2026<\/p>\n

\u2014from \u201cRest in Peace,\u201d\u00a0<\/em>translated by Edith Grossman<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Oddly, as time passed, I noticed that Nicanor began putting the book that I had edited into his biography and bibliography. Maybe, just maybe,<\/em> I thought.\u00a0<\/em>Or \u2026 better never mind.<\/p>\n

Nicanor was a great poet because he didn\u2019t mince words. As he writes:<\/p>\n

For half a century
\nPoetry was the paradise
\nOf the solemn fool.
\nUntil I came along
\nAnd built my rollercoaster.<\/p>\n

Go up, if you feel like it.
\nIt\u2019s not my fault if you come down
\nBleeding from your nose and mouth.<\/p>\n

\u2014from \u201cRoller Coaster,\u201d\u00a0translated by Miller Williams<\/p>\n

 <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

David Unger\u2019s latest novel is\u00a0<\/em>The Mastermind. His other books include <\/em>Ni chicha, ni limonada;<\/em> The Price of Escape;<\/em> Para M\u00ed, Eres Divina;\u00a0and <\/em>Life in the Damn Tropics. His writing has appeared in <\/em>Puertos Abiertos,<\/em> Guernica,<\/em>\u00a0and <\/em>Playboy Mexico. He has translated\u00a0fourteen\u00a0books, including <\/em>the\u00a0<\/em>Popol Vuh\u2014<\/em>Guatemala\u2019s pre-Columbian creation myth\u2014and the work of Rigoberta Mench\u00fa, Silvia Molina, Nicanor Parra, Teresa C\u00e1rdenas, and Mario Benedetti, among others.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nicanor Parra died last week at\u00a0the age of\u00a0a hundred three. Here, David Unger remembers a collaboration with\u00a0Parra that seemed doomed from the start.\u00a0   I first began translating the Chilean poet Nicanor Parra in 1973, on the recommendation of Frank MacShane, the professor of my graduate translation course at Columbia University. I bought Obra gruesa, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1379,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[32747,6847,32752,32753,32754,32748,7192,32749,32745,5245,3914,2161,22334,23737,32743,32744,32746],"class_list":["post-120867","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-in-memoriam","tag-antipoems-new-and-selected","tag-chile","tag-chilean-literature","tag-chilean-poetry","tag-david-unger","tag-frederick-martin","tag-hungarian-pastry-shop","tag-individuals-soliloquy","tag-letters-from-a-poet-who-sleeps-in-a-chair","tag-new-directions","tag-nicanor-parra","tag-pablo-neruda","tag-poems-in-translation","tag-poetry-in-translation","tag-rest-in-peace","tag-roller-coaster","tag-the-man-he-imagined"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nNicanor Parra, the Alpha-Male Poet<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Nicanor tolerated me, at best, like a recurring hacking cough. 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