The memoirs of Pablo Neruda (1904-73), the great Chilean poet and Nobel laureate, first translated into English in 1977, have been newly expanded here in subtle and significant ways with the addition of previously unpublished or incomplete manuscripts, explanatory editorial notes, and an instructive chronology ... This greatly improved edition will appeal to Neruda completists and aficionados, and it will serve as a fascinating entry point for anyone interested in a firsthand look at the raw material of this legendary poet’s life.
It is impossible not to feel a thrill of expectation upon opening The Complete Memoirs by Pablo Neruda. But once a reader discovers what’s actually on its pages, the title’s claim of completeness—with its promise of juicy restorations and the accretion of long-lost chapters written by the great Chilean poet—seems no better than a gimmick to sell afresh a book that was first published in English translation 44 years ago ... Readers who know their Neruda will contend that only one textual addition—which deals plainspokenly with the homosexuality of the Spanish poet Federico García Lorca—truly adds value. Which is fine, of course, because the original version—let us not call it 'incomplete'—is a deliciously self-serving and unabashed narrative account of the poet’s life, loves, grudges, contempt and ideology. It is stunningly vain in places yet always beautiful...
The fresh material is skillfully woven into the original memoir, which Neruda called his 'journey around myself,' with evocations of his family and childhood, global travels, friends and foes, carnal desires, aspirations and achievements as a poet, and celebration of the natural world ... Overall, the selections round out Neruda’s image as a poet ... Emendations that contribute to a nuanced portrait of a complex man.
