Neruda: poet, Communist... and seashell collector
Thursday 03 December 2009
Latest in Europe
On Facebook
From the blogs
Roy Hodgson for England: A club of one
To argue against Harry Redknapp for England is akin to arguing in favour of bankers bonuses. While s...
Time for a reality check on the Sri Lankan civil war
Sri Lanka, much like Britain, has side-lined accountability long enough.
Children Of Alcoholics week: One million children may just be the tip of the iceberg
Children Of Alcoholics week starts today. So, what are the aims for Nacoa during this important week...
Review of Being Human: ‘Being Human 1955’
Following on from an episode tinged with tragedy, this week lifted the mood with something lighter.
The Chilean poet Pablo Neruda is known for many things: he was a career diplomat, an avid Communist, and of course, the Nobel Prize-winning author of erotically charged love poems, memoirs and surrealist verse.
But a seashell collector? Neruda's name might evoke images of the thousands of Spanish Civil War refugees he shipped to Chile on The Winnipeg, or the crowds who showed up for his funeral against the orders of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet. A stooping beachcomber with trousers rolled is certainly not the image of him that usually comes to mind.
The author of Twenty Poems of Love and a Song of Despair, however, was indeed passionate about the exoskeletons of molluscs. When he was not scribbling his verses or speaking in support of left-wing figures like Stalin, he was combing markets and beaches around the world for the perfect, spirally conch. Over the course of two decades, he amassed 9,000 seashells, including one from the Chinese leader Mao Zedong.
More than 400 specimens of this little-known collection of seashells – "small countries of mother of pearl" as he called them – are now on public view for the first time at the Instituto de Cervantes in Madrid. He donated the fruits of his obsession to the University of Chile in 1954. "Neruda was constantly inspired, and amazed, at this extraordinary gift of nature," said the exhibit curator, Pedro Nunez.
The poet considered the shell a metaphor for the diversity of life within the boundaries of rigid mathematical proportions, he said. They appear, in more or less recognisable form, throughout his poems. In one verse they are "immobile legacies imprisoned by a furious wave". In another, his beloved exoskeletons morph into "the breasts of the sirens", "petrified waves" and the "immobilised play of the foam". "The best thing I have collected in my life are my shells," the poet once wrote. "They gave me the pleasure of their prodigious structure, the lunar purity of their mysterious porcelain."
The exhibit, accompanied by a soundtrack of rolling waves, demonstrates the depth of Neruda's maritime love affair – to the point of acquiring tomes filled with catalogues of species.
"I remember in the museum of Peking they opened the most sacred box of molluscs from the China Sea to give me one of only two specimens of the Thatcheria mirabilis," he said on donating his collection. "This foam of the seven seas I deliver to the university."
- 1 Lightning kills an entire football team
- 2 Fear for deported Saudi 'ridiculous', says Malaysian home minister
- 3 Eight arrests as Murdoch 'throws staff to the wolves'
- 4 Israel blames Iran for embassy bomb attacks
- 5 Now The Sun tries to call in its favours from Downing Street
- 6 I was born to be a killer. Every night I see the Devil in my dreams
- 7 BBC to issue global apology for documentaries that broke rules
- 1 Kate Allen: It's time for America to put an end to this shameful scandal
- 2 Spotify: 1 million plays, £108 return
- 3 Chemotherapy is 'safe during pregnancy'
- 4 Rhodri Marsden: What we like and what we don't like are often closer than you'd think
- 5 BBC to issue global apology for documentaries that broke rules
- 6 Lightning kills an entire football team
- 7 I was born to be a killer. Every night I see the Devil in my dreams
- 8 Henry does it his way, ending on a high note
- 9 Modern lovers: The 'sexual body warriors' and pioneers transforming 21st-century relationships
- 10 Redknapp hints at same old faces for England
Free trial of new Independent iPad app
Get your daily dose of the best of British journalism, sponsored by American Airlines
Win a three-week coastal jaunt
Spend three weeks exploring every nook and cranny of gorgeous Atlantic Canada.
Amazing restaurant offers
Three glasses of free champagne and a special menu at 46 top London restaurants.
Latest Independent competitions
Win anything from gadgets to five-star holidays on our competitions and offers page.
Commercial thought leaders
Watch the best in the business world give their insights into the world of business.
Day In a Page
Apple admits it has a human rights problem
James Lawton: AVB looks all at sea
Procrastination: Not now – I'm busy
Silent revolution at the Baftas
The diva who had – and lost – it all


Comments