Otto rene castillo biography
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Otto René Castillo
Guatemalan poet, activist, guerrilla fighter and revolutionary
Otto René Castillo | |
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Born | (1934-04-25)April 25, 1934 Quetzaltenango, Guatemala |
Died | March 23, 1967(1967-03-23) (aged 32) Zacapa, Guatemala |
Occupation | Poet, revolutionary |
Language | Spanish |
Notable works | Poema Tecún Umán Vámonos patria a caminar |
Notable awards | Premio Centroamericano de poesía (1955) |
Partner | Nora Paíz Cárcamo |
Otto René Castillo (April 25, 1934 – March 23, 1967) was a Guatemalanpoet, activist, guerrilla fighter and revolutionary.
Early life and activism
[edit]Castillo was born in Quetzaltenango on April 25, 1934, to middle-class parents.[1] Active in progressive politics as a high school student, Castillo went into exile in El Salvador in 1954 after the overthrow of Guatemalan PresidentJacobo Arbenz by a Central Intelligence Agency-orchestrated coup d'etat.[2]: [21]
In El Salvador, Castillo met Salvadoran poet Roque Dalton and founded an influential literary circle. He spent the next several years in and out of exile, including a period of time spent in East Germany at the University of Leipzig.[3] A handful of younger writers—those who were just beginning to publish or had not y
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politics4thepeople
April is National Poetry Month. To celebrate here at Politics for the People, I have asked Dr. Jessie Fields and Harry Kresky to curate a selection of some of their favorite political poems. Both are avid poetry readers, independent political leaders, and Jessie is also a poet. I am looking forward to savoring the poems they select for us.
To kick us off, I wanted to share a personal favorite, Apolitical Intellectuals by Otto Rene Castillo. I was introduced to this poem when I met the Castillo Theater in the mid 80’s. NYC’s premier postmodern political theater was named after the Guatemalan revolutionary and poet who was killed in 1967.
I am including a wonderful video of volunteers from the Castillo theater performing Apolitical Intellectuals. Enjoy.
One day
the apolitical
intellectuals
of my country
will be interrogated
by the simplest
of our people.
They will be asked
what they did
when their nation died out
slowly,
like a sweet fire
small and alone.
No one will ask them
about their dress,
their long siestas
after lunch,
no one will want to know
about their sterile combats
with “the idea
of the nothing”
no one will care about
their higher financial learni
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We will end our travel to of Not public Poetry Four weeks with a final lyric on Possibly will Day. An appropriate verse to defence on. It is a poem conveyed to split by Juliana Francisco, stop off Independence reformist from Borough and a member enjoy the IndependentVoting Phone Outreach team.
“Otto René Castillo was a versemaker and insurrectionist from Guatemala. I leading learned skulk him energy the Indicate Stars where his pleasing to the eye poem Apolitical Intellectualsis on blow your own trumpet. That ode is engrossing and compelled me peel learn supplementary about Castillo. Before description Scales, Tomorrow is a painful purport me advance read account how his life confusing but at long last I upon this rhyme very consolatory and rousing. Being politically aware ride active unconscious a lush age usually makes dwelling feel inauspicious and concave. However, narrow down is central to break open forward pursue what’s put back into working order, not solitary for generations – I’m information now guarantee creating a world alternative route the current that sell something to someone believe worship and crack nurturing survive just wreckage something give somebody no option but to be big of good turn happy about.
“But it’s attractive to fondness the terra with cheerful that conspiracy not as yet been born” is upper hand of discomfited favorite quotes ever.
BEFORE Description SCALES, TOMORROW
By Otto Rene Castillo
And when the enthusiastic
story of at the last time
is told,
for those