''Altazor o el viaje en paracaídas'', or simply ''Altazor'', is the

magnum opus A masterpiece, , or ; ; ) is a creation that has been given much critical praise, especially one that is considered the greatest work of a person's career or a work of outstanding creativity, skill, profundity, or workmanship. Historically, ...

of Chilean poet

Vicente Huidobro Vicente García-Huidobro Fernández (; January 10, 1893 – January 2, 1948) was a Chilean poet born to an aristocracy, aristocratic family. He promoted the avant-garde literary movement in Chile and was the creator and greatest exponent of t ...

, published in

Madrid Madrid ( ; ) is the capital and List of largest cities in Spain, most populous municipality of Spain. It has almost 3.5 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 7 million. It i ...

in 1931. This poem in the shape of a book can be classified as an example of the Avant-garde literature movement developed during the first half of the twentieth century. It can also be thought of as part of the

Creacionismo Creationism () was a literary movement initiated by Chilean poet Vicente Huidobro around 1912. Creationism is based on the idea of a poem as a truly ''new'' thing, created by the author for the sake of itself—that is, not to praise another ...

(Creationism literary movement) along with

Pablo Neruda Pablo Neruda ( ; ; born Ricardo Eliécer Neftalí Reyes Basoalto; 12 July 190423 September 1973) was a Chilean poet-diplomat and politician who won the 1971 Nobel Prize in Literature. Neruda became known as a poet when he was 13 years old an ...

's "Residencia en la Tierra",

César Vallejo César Abraham Vallejo Mendoza (March 16, 1892 – April 15, 1938) was a Peruvian poet, writer, playwright, and journalist. Although he published only two books of poetry during his lifetime, he is considered one of the great poetic innovators ...

's "Trilce", and

Pablo de Rokha Pablo de Rokha (born Carlos Ignacio Díaz Loyola; 17 October 1894 – 10 September 1968) was a Chilean poet. He won the Chilean Premio Nacional de Literatura de Chile, Premio Nacional de Literatura (National Literature Prize) in 1965 and is c ...

's "Los gemidos". The name "altazor" is a combination of the noun "altura" ("altitude") and the adjective "azorado" ("bewildered" or "taken aback"). "Azorado" has more than one meaning in Spanish and can be interpreted in different ways. The poem is divided in seven "cantos", ("songs"), preceded by a preface. These cantos were written over an extensive period of time, from 1919 to 1931,Altazor review
bookslut.com, Laura Felch, January 2004, Retrieved June 15, 2015 and for that reason the topics seem unrelated. The first canto is the longest with almost seven hundred verses, and its content feels

metaphysical Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that examines the basic structure of reality. It is traditionally seen as the study of mind-independent features of the world, but some theorists view it as an inquiry into the conceptual framework of h ...

. In this first canto, the poet introduces himself as "Altazor". The second canto, by contrast, is an

ode An ode (from ) is a type of lyric poetry, with its origins in Ancient Greece. Odes are elaborately structured poems praising or glorifying an event or individual, describing nature intellectually as well as emotionally. A classic ode is structu ...

to women, while in cantos III to VII the author plays with and dismantles the language and its expressive limits. ;A fragment of Altazor: The waterfall tresses over the night While the night beds to rest With its moon that pillows the sky I iris the sleepy land That roads towards the horizon In the shade of a shipwrecking tree The book includes a

Picasso Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, Ceramic art, ceramicist, and Scenic ...

portrait of Huidobro. In honour of Huidobro's work, the poem has been used to name the Chilean Award of the National Arts, known as the

Altazor Award The Altazor Award of the National Arts or simply Altazor, is a Chilean award which is awarded annually. The winners are chosen by the own creators and performers of the arts. They were established in 1958, but were not awarded until 1999. The a ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Altazor 1931 poetry books Chilean poetry collections Public domain books

See also

References