UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Los Angeles The Roots of Transformation

190 Pages·2017·0.89 MB·English

by  Daniel Cooper

UCLA
UCLA Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Title
The Roots of Transformation: Octavio Paz and the Radical Americanist Awakening of Pablo
Neruda
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https://escholarship.org/uc/item/1dq2f3vv
Author
Cooper, Daniel
Publication Date
2018

Peer reviewed|Thesis/dissertation
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UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA
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The Roots of Transformation:
Octavio Paz and the Militant Americanist Awakening of Pablo Neruda

A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree
Doctor of Philosophy in Hispanic Languages and Literatures

by

Daniel Solomon Cooper

2018
© Copyright by
Daniel Solomon Cooper
2018
ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION

The Roots of Transformation:
Octavio Paz and the Radical Americanist Awakening of Pablo Neruda

by

Daniel Solomon Cooper
Doctor of Philosophy in Hispanic Literatures and Languages
University of California, Los Angeles, 2018
Professor Maarten H. van Delden, Chair

In this dissertation I examine the roots of one of twentieth-century Latin America’s most
crucial literary exchanges, namely, that between the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda and his Mexican
counterpart Octavio Paz. Specifically, I focus on their initial point of contact in 1937, when the
much younger Paz sent his recently published poem Raíz del hombre to his idol Neruda, then
living in Paris where he was organizing the Congress of Antifascist Writers in the context of the
Spanish Civil War. While Neruda never elaborated on his appreciation for Raíz del hombre
beyond the cryptic detail in his memoir of having identified in it “un germen verdadero,” it is
understood that he invited Paz to the Congress based on his positive reading. Therefore, and in
light of the gaping hole in the Neruda-Paz scholarship whereby no systematic examination of this
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first point of contact exists, I offer a speculative “Nerudian reading” of Raíz del hombre to
understand why such an ostensibly apolitical erotic poem appealed to a poet who, at the time,
was undergoing a dramatic transformation toward an aesthetic of revolutionary commitment.
Arguing for a generous conception of poetic influence based on Harold Bloom’s
paradigm whereby a successor might exert power over his predecessor, I suggest that Neruda
registers the influence of Raíz del hombre—and betrays a certain anxiety toward that influence—
in “Oda de invierno al Río Mapocho” (1938), his first socially engaged poem in a Latin
American setting. In that poem, Neruda returns to the aesthetic of natural eroticism that he had
cultivated in Residencia en la tierra in order to locate the potential for revolutionary salvation in
the topography of Latin America. At the poem’s conclusion, the speaker exhorts Chile’s
Mapocho River: “que una gota de tu espuma negra / salte del légamo a la flor del fuego / y
precipite la semilla del hombre!” With the slight change from “raíz del hombre” to “semilla del
hombre,” in my opinion, Neruda offers at once a tacit confirmation of his positive reading of
Paz’s work, and a rhetorical exercise of power to reclaim for himself the residenciario poetics
that his successor had made his own in his emergence as a formidable newcomer to the world of
Hispanic poetry.
In Chapter I, I offer an extended introduction to the dynamics surrounding Neruda and
Paz’s initial encounter, primarily in the form of an analysis of Paz’s importance in the early years
of Neruda’s transformation from trench warfare poet in the Spanish Civil War to committed
Latin Americanist poet par excellence. To strengthen my argument regarding Paz’s contributions
in Neruda’s trajectory, I introduce a reading of Harold Bloom’s theory of poetic influence. I also
discuss how Paz’s emergence as a strong poet in the context of Neruda’s ascendant celebrity in
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the Spanish-speaking world likely induced a certain anxiety in the Chilean. The chapter
concludes with a comparative analysis of Paz’s ¡No pasarán! and Neruda’s “Galope muerto.”
In Chapter II, I offer a Nerudian reading of Raíz del hombre in order to identify the
implicit radicalism of Paz’s poem, the raison d’être of which critics tend to elevate as an
eroticism stripped of political meaning. To do so I read the poem’s celebration of love as the root
of man in a context of ruins as a metaphor for the revolutionary solidarity required in the struggle
against fascism.
In Chapter III, I explore the centrality of “Oda de invierno al Río Mapocho” within both
Neruda’s late-1930s transformation and his broader poetic trajectory. Arguing that the poem
offers a commentary on the debate du jour regarding pure versus committed poetry, I discuss
how the poet engages not only with Paz, but also with the voices of Francisco de Quevedo and
Rainer Maria Rilke. In this way I demonstrate how Paz’s treatment in Raíz del hombre of those
poets’ respective and optimistic understandings of death inspired Neruda’s hopeful vision for a
revolutionary future in Latin America as well as his commitment to an aesthetic of engagement.
Following a brief Conclusion, I end my dissertation with an English translation of Raíz
del hombre as it appears in its entirety in Paz’s 1999 Obras completas.

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The dissertation of Daniel Solomon Cooper is approved.
Efraín Kristal
Jorge Marturano
Sara Poot-Herrera
Maarten H. van Delden, Committee Chair

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For Grandpa Sam

O Lord, grant death to each in one’s own way.
Grant that one may pass away from a life
that was filled with love, meaning, and desire.

Rainer Maria Rilke

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION…………………………………………………………..…………….1

CHAPTER I:
Octavio Paz in Pablo Neruda’s Transformation…………………………………………..14

Dynamics of a Transformation:
From the Trenches of Spain to the Banks of the Mapocho……………………….14

The Crucial Presence of Octavio Paz……………………………………………..19

The Bi-Directional Flow of Poetic Influence……………………………………..23

Transcending the Rupture: Neruda’s Appreciation for Raíz del hombre…………27

Sovereignty Threatened: Neruda in Spain and Paz’s Emergence...…...………….33

Poetic Antecedents: ¡No pasarán! and “Galope muerto”………………………...40

CHAPTER II:
The Revolutionary Implications of Raíz del hombre: A Nerudian Reading……………...50

Introduction……………………………………………………………………….50

“No hay raíces / para el hombre”:
Neruda’s Enigmatic Hopelessness in “Canto sobre unas ruinas”………………...54

Retreat from Reason: A Historicist Reading of Raíz del hombre………………...65

Love as the Root of Man:
An Antifascist Message and Response to ¡No pasarán!.........................................79

Radicalism and the Quest for Roots………………………………………………98

CHAPTER III:
“Oda de invierno al Río Mapocho”: Returning to Roots, Planting a Seed……………….110

Introduction……………………………………………………………………….110

Registering the Transformation:
“Oda de invierno al Río Mapocho” as a Critique of Poetry………………………112

Prologues as Epilogue:
The Legacy of “Oda de invierno al Río Mapocho” in Neruda’s Final Writings….138

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CONCLUSION…………………………………………………………………………...150

APPENDIX:
Translation of Raíz del hombre…………………………………………………….……..154

Note……………………………………………………………………...…….….154

Root of Man……………………….………………………………………………157

WORKS CITED……………………………………………….………………………….168

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