Rodrigo Lira

Translated from the Spanish by Thomas Rothe and Rodrigo Olavarría

Poetry
Bilingual edition
Paperback
170 pages
ISBN 978-1-945720-11-6
September 18, 2018

“The true heir of Nicanor Parra and Enrique Lihn’s protégé, Rodrigo Lira is still considered a cult author in Chile. Halfway between the figure of the madman and the genius, halfway between the myth and the legend, Lira wrote poems that were authentic, weird and precious gems. Owner of a unique style, combining irony, intertextuality, and a sharp sense of humor, Lira was an absolute underground poet, whose work was circulated by hand in thousands of Xerox copies that flooded the most notorious university campuses in Santiago de Chile during Pinochet’s dictatorship. Now, for the very first time, his poems are available in English thanks to the bold, delicate and meticulous translation of Rodrigo Olavarría (the only authorized voice of Allen Ginsberg in Spanish) and Thomas Rothe (translator of Jaime Huenún’s Fanon City Meu). I don’t think there is a way to fully understand contemporary Chilean poetry without having read Rodrigo Lira’s exquisite and extravagant poems.”—Carlos Soto-Román

"Rodrigo Lira’s elegance, his disdain, make him off limits for any publisher. The cowardly don’t publish the brave."—Roberto Bolaño 

“Rodrigo Lira’s ‘Testimony of Circumstances‘ is vicious. In it, Lira mocks the literary establishment, depicts life under Pinochet’s regime, and narrates his experiences with mental illness. This tour de force poem is densely allusive, parodic, and endlessly playful.” —Aditi Machado, Asymptote

 Author 

Rodrigo Lira was born in Santiago in 1949. He gained notoriety during the seventies for his dramatic public readings and eccentric parodies of many established Chilean poets. Tormented by a diagnosis of schizophrenia as well as social marginalization, he committed suicide in 1981, on his thirty-second birthday. After his death and the posthumous publication of his first collection of poems, Proyecto de obras completas, interest in Lira’s poetry and life grew exponentially into a cult following that has influenced many younger generations of Chilean poets and writers. Combining erudite literary knowledge, intense language, and dark burlesque humor, Lira’s work is often compared to contemporaries Nicanor Parra and Enrique Lihn. Roberto Bolaño described him as “one of the last poets of Latin America.”



 Translator 

Thomas Rothe was born in Berkeley, California. He has translated the poetry and prose of various Latin American authors, including Rodrigo Lira, Jaime Huenún, Emma Villazón, and Margarita García Robayo. His translations have been published in The Arkansas International, MAKE Magazine, Asymptote, InTranslation, Jacket2, OOMPH!, and Lunch Ticket, among other journals. His translation of Jaime Huenún’s Fanon City Meu was recently published by Diálogos Books.


Rodrigo Olavarría was born in Puerto Montt, Chile. He has published two novels, Cuaderno esclavo (2017) and Alameda tras las rejas (2010), and one volume of poetry, La noche migratoria (2006). His short stories and poetry have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies. He has translated books by Edgar Lee Masters, Herman Melville, Eileen Myles, and Sylvia Plath, among others. His Spanish translations of Allen Ginsberg’s Howl and Other Poems and Kaddish and Other Poems were published by Anagrama in 2006 and 2014, respectively.