WB Yeats asked in his poem "Among School Children", how can we know the dancer from the dance?

This fusion — the artist with the art — presents us with fascinating and troubling questions.

Is the artist an artist solely?

Where does humanity enter and exit?

In what way is the art itself more important than love and kindness, even if the love and kindness might in some way threaten the art?

And those questions come to mind when we consider the life and work of Pablo Neruda.

Neruda — born Ricardo Reyes Basoalto — was a Chilean poet and socialist diplomat, who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1971.

Neruda died at the age of 69 in 1973: he had been hospitalized with cancer but new evidence in recent years suggests that he was poisoned on the orders of Augusto Pinochet, who had recently staged a successful coup and ruled the country as a dictator for the next 17 years.

Fellow South American Gabriel Garcia Marquez, a native of Colombia, once called Neruda "the greatest poet of the 20th century in any language".

But he is not without his demons: while stationed in Spain as a diplomat, he abandoned his first wife and only daughter: the child spent most of her short life sick and in care and died at the age of eight, while refusing to help his Dutch wife flee Nazi-occupied Netherlands to Chile.

Maybe there are echoes of those complex questions — of the role of the poet in the world — in this poem, "Ode to a Large Tuna in the Market", translated here by Robin Robertson.

Generally, it is often interpreted as a musing on nature’s unknowable depths, the darkness that exists in this world that we cannot really know.

As I read it, I thought of the dark depths within the poet and the artist: how the poet does not just capture or describe the world, but is also fully part of it, and how none of us are ever all good or all evil, but as the Russian writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn said, "the line through good and evil goes through the heart of every man".

You can read the poem here

***

For a detailed outline of the mission and purpose behind this podcast, please check out Episode 100, "Why Poems for the Speed of Life?", in your podcast player or ⁠⁠⁠⁠click here to listen on Spotify⁠⁠⁠⁠.

If you’re on social media, you can follow on Twitter here, Instagram here and Facebook here.

Subscribe to or follow the show for free wherever you listen to podcasts.

To leave the show a review:

On Spotify. Open the Spotify app (iOS or Android), ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠find the show⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and tap to rate five-stars. (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Details here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠)On Apple. Open your Apple Podcasts app, find the show and tap to rate five-stars. (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Details here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠)On Podchaser. Open the Podchaser website, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠find the show⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and tap to rate five-stars. (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Details here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠)

Music Credit:

Once Upon a Time by Alex-Productions | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://onsound.eu/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  | Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com