Wednesday, February 26, 2014

LATIN AMERICAN POETRY FESTIVAL LAUNCH FOR COLD HUB PRESS CHAPBOOK



Cactus body, a bilingual chapbook of poems by Nicaraguan poet Blanca Castellón (centre), with translations by Roger Hickin, was launched recently at the 10th International Poetry Festival in Granada, Nicaragua, with the participation of New Zealand poet Michael Harlow & Castellón’s fellow Nicaraguan author Gioconda Belli. 

Cactus body was published in New Zealand by Cold Hub Press (coldhubpress.co.nz) which also recently published So we lost paradise, a bilingual selected poems of Chilean poet Juan Cameron, who was at the festival as well.


Michael Harlow (whose selected poems, Sweeping the courtyard is due out next month from Cold Hub) was this year’s New Zealand poet at the festival, which is one the major cultural events of Latin America. 

Around 406 million people speak Spanish as a first language, and while many non-Hispanic poets are funded by their respective arts councils to travel to Granada, New Zealand writers fortunate enough to be invited to this extraordinary event are left to pay their own way.

No comments: