100 Refutations | Poetry | Spanish
June, 2018This canción was published for the first time in the Costa Rican journal El Repertorio Americano, having been translated into Spanish by Don Daniel Alomías Roble, a notable compiler of Peruvian Incan music. Daniel Alomías Roble (1871-1942) is perhaps best known for composing “El Condor Pasa,” popularized in the English-speaking world by Simon and Garfunkel. He was born in Huánuco, Peru to a French immigrant father and a Peruvian mother. When he was thirteen his mother sent him to Lima to study, and under the tutelage of his uncle he took up all manner of artistic endeavors. Eventually he devoted himself to music and the preservation of his Incan heritage, traveling all across the Andes to compile old Incan songs and compose many of his own.
100 Refutations | Guatemala | Poetry | Spanish
June, 2018María Josefa García Granados (1796-1848) was one of Guatemala’s principal literary figures despite the many limitations placed on her due to her gender and the customs of the time. She carved out for herself an important place in the poetic scene, publishing widely—first under a male pseudonym and then under her own name—and founding two newspapers. She was a renowned feminist ahead of her time and the co-author of one of the most scandalous pieces of Guatemalan literature, described by many as a pornographic piece of ingenious craftsmanship and superb rhyme, which she dedicated to the clergyman, José María Castilla. She was also the sister of the first liberal president of Guatemala, Miguel Garcia Granados. Because of her many important political connections, she had to flee her country and live in a semi-voluntary exile during a volatile political period that did not favor her brother.
100 Refutations | Poetry | Spanish
June, 2018This poem tells the traditional Guaraní story of the creation of the world as relayed over the course of hundreds of years. Here the great creator, Ñamandu Ru Ete, asks one of the True Fathers of the soul-words to make the world, but he refuses because he knows what humans will do to the world and each other. Ñamandu Ru Ete then asks Jakaira Ru Ete to make the world. Jakaira Ru Ete accepts, promising to alleviate with his mist the misfortune that will inevitably befall humankind in the world he creates for them.
100 Refutations | Argentina | Poetry | Spanish
June, 2018Pedro Bonifacio Palacios (1854-1917) was an Argentine artist, writer, teacher, librarian, translator, and journalist who lived at the turn of the twentieth century and published under several different pseudonyms. His most well-known pseudonym was "Almafuerte," which translates to "strong soul."
100 Refutations | Essay | Poetry
June, 2018Welcome to the thirteenth week of 100 Refutations. For one hundred days, we’re publishing a daily poem from one of the countries recently denigrated by the president of the United States. Lina M. Ferreira C.-V., who conceived and compiled the series and translated many of its poems, has been working tirelessly on this enormous project, with the help of several collaborators, since the president’s comments in January. We’re accompanying the daily poems with a weekly essay by Lina, and the thirteenth one is featured here.
– InTranslation editors
100 Refutations | Poetry | Spanish
June, 2018The poem featured here was written by an unknown Incan poet from the region of Jauja, which is in present-day Peru. It was originally collected by R. and M. d’Harcourt under the title “La musique des Incas et ses survivance” and published in Cantares Quechuas (1925).
100 Refutations | Poetry | Spanish
June, 2018According to Abraham Arias-Larreta in Literaturas Aborigenes de America (1976), “The Mayan Uinal was a period of 20 days, each of them with a different name. The Mayan year, or Haab, was composed of 18 Uinales and a final period of 5 days, the Xma Kaba Kin, nameless days.”
100 Refutations | Panama | Poetry | Spanish
June, 2018Lil Marie Herrera is an award-winning journalist and poet. Her poetry collections include Metaldevoz (2006); Niño, mango, guayacán (2006); Todo en regla (2009); Di versos, poemas traviesos (2011); Tenaz Pepita Nador (2011); Juegos Mentales (2015); and Chifladuras (cada loco con su verso) (2015). Her many awards include the Esther María Osses Ministry of Labor Poetry Prize (2006); the Amelia Denis Icaza Municipal Poetry Prize (2006); the León A. Soto Municipal Poetry Prize (2006, 2014); the Women’s Poetry Prize: Voices, Images, and Testimonies (2009); The Hersilia Ramos de Argote National Prize for Children’s Poetry (2011, 2014, 2015); and the Esther María Osses National Prize for Child and Youth Poetry (2015). For more information, see the Panamanian poetry blog Afinidades Electivas.
The poem featured here appears in Juegos Mentales (2015).
100 Refutations | Poetry (excerpt) | Spanish
June, 2018According to Abraham Arias-Larreta in Literaturas Aborigenes de America (1976), “‘Chilam’ was the title given to prophets of the priestly caste of the Mayas. ‘Balam,’ which literally means ‘jaguar,’ was the name of the famous, and last, prophet before the European conquest. He was, precisely, the one to have foretold of the arrival of the invaders who would establish a new religion. When the sacred books of the Mayas from Yucatán were partially reproduced using the Maya language and the European alphabet, he was given the name of the great [biblical] prophet, Balam. Since then these [sacred books] have been known as ‘The Books of Chilam Balam.’”
100 Refutations | Poetry | Puerto Rico | Spanish
June, 2018Cindy Jiménez-Vera is the author of four poetry collections: No lugar (2017), Islandia (2015), 400 nuevos soles (2013), and Tegucigalpa (2012). She has also published a book chronicling her trip to San Sebastián, entitled En San Sebastián, su pueblo y el mío (2014), and a collection of children’s poetry, El gran cheeseburger y otros poemas con dientes (2015). Her work has been translated into English, Italian, and Portuguese, and published in literary and academic journals, anthologies, textbooks, newspapers, and websites across South America, the Caribbean, the US, and elsewhere. For more information, please visit her blog.
The Brooklyn Rail welcomes you to our web-exclusive section InTranslation, where we feature unpublished translations of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and dramatic writing. Published since April 2007, InTranslation is a venue for outstanding work in translation and a resource for translators, authors, editors, and publishers seeking to collaborate.
We seek exceptional unpublished English translations from all languages.
Fiction, Nonfiction, and Poetry: Manuscripts of no longer than 20 pages (double-spaced).
Plays: Manuscripts of no longer than 30 pages (in left-justified format).