San Miguel Poetry Week celebrates 12th anniversary
By Kathy Snodgrass January 4, 2008 San Miguel de Allende

San Miguel Poetry Week
Jan 7–11
Bellas Artes
Free

This will be year twelve for the San Miguel Poetry Week, founded by sisters and writers Jennifer Clement and Barbara Sibley. Theirs is an intimate program in which a few dozen poet-participants from the US and Mexico spend each morning in intensive workshops with major poets from both the US and the UK. As many Atención readers know from past years, faculty and guest poets give nightly readings in Bellas Artes that are free and open to the public. This year’s poets wear numerous hats—teachers, translators, editors, novelists, literary critics and librettists.

Tony Barnstone, a professor of English at Whittier College, has published numerous books of poetry and translations from the Chinese.

His forthcoming books are Chinese Erotic Poems (Everyman Press) and a book of poems, The Golem of Los Angeles (Red Hen Press), which received the Benjamin Saltman Award in Poetry. He has won fellowships from the NEA and the California Arts Council; his awards include the Randall Jarrell Prize and the Pablo Neruda Prize in Poetry.

Jennifer Clement’s book of new and selected poems will be published by Shearsman Books (UK) in 2008. Her novel, A True Story Based on Lies, was a finalist for the UK’s Orange Prize and Whoopi Goldberg bought the film rights. Her many awards include Mexico’s Sistema Nacional de Creadores, a US-Mexico Fund for Culture grant, and a MacDowell Fellowship. Her story, “A Salamander-Child,” received the UK’s Canongate Prize. Clement’s work has been translated into eight languages.

Reginald Gibbons edited TriQuarterly from 1981 to 1997; he also co-founded and edited TriQuarterly Books. He has received Guggenheim and NEA fellowships, the Carl Sandburg Prize and the Folger Shakespeare Library’s O.B. Hardison Jr. Poetry Prize. His most recent book is an edition of autobiographical writings by William Goyen (U of Texas Press, 2007). Forthcoming in 2008 are a book of poems, Creatures of a Day (LSU Press) and Selected Poems of Sophocles (Princeton University Press).

David Harsent has published nine books of poetry, including Legion, which won the 2005 Forward Prize and was short-listed for the Whitbread Award and the T.S. Eliot Prize. He has collaborated with Harrison Birtwistle on commissions from the Royal Opera House and BBC Radio. Under the pseudonym David Lawrence, he has written crime novels, which were translated into 14 languages. Harsent is Distinguished Writing Fellow at Hallam University and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

Pedro Serrano was born in Montreal in 1957 and teaches in UNAM’s Faculty of the Humanities. He has published four books of poetry. With Carlos López Beltrán, he edited and translated the anthology of contemporary British poets, La generación del cordero: Antología de la poesía en las Islas Británicas (Trilce, 2000). His libretto for the opera, Marimbas de l’Exile/El norte en Veracruz, was staged in Paris and in Mexico City. This past year he received a grant from the Guggenheim Foundation.

Kathy Snodgrass is the author of The Fiction of Hortense Calisher (U of Delaware Press, 1993). For the past 10 years, her essay-reviews of short fiction have appeared biannually in The Georgia Review. Her translations of contemporary Mexican poets Luis Miguel Aguilar, Fabio Morábito, Ricardo Yáñez, Héctor Carreto and Dana Gelinas have appeared in numerous literary magazines.

W.D. Snodgrass received the Pulitzer Prize and England’s Guinness Prize for his first book, Heart’s Needle. The author of books of poetry, criticism and translation, he has received fellowships from the Ford, Rockefeller, Ingram Merrill and Guggenheim foundations.

His 1998 Selected Translations received the Harold Morton Landon Translation Award. He is a three-time finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, most recently for Not for Specialists: New and Selected Poems (BOA, 2006).

C.K. Williams teaches in the creative writing program at Princeton. His books of poetry include The Singing (2003), which won the National Book Award; Repair (1999), winner of the Pulitzer Prize; and Flesh and Blood (1987), which won the National Book Critics Circle Award. Awards and honors include a Guggenheim fellowship, the Lila Wallace Reader’s Digest Award, The Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize for lifetime achievement in poetry.

Kathy Snodgrass, writer and translator, is a long-time winter resident of San Miguel, in company with her husband, W.D. Snodgrass.

San Miguel PEN to present 2008 Winter Series
By Lucina Kathman

International PEN, the largest worldwide association of writers, with 148 centers in 104 countries, promotes friendship and intellectual cooperation among writers everywhere. Its struggles for freedom of expression represent the conscience of world literature.

PEN’s London office typically deals with about 1,000 cases of writers who have been recently murdered, jailed, or threatened because of what they have written. The writers may have run afoul of a repressive government, but the problem could also be drug lords or rebel armies. For over 25 years, San Miguel PEN has helped such endangered writers.

San Miguel PEN was created in 1979 as an English-language center within Latin America, with the mandate to help writers with the then-violent revolutions in Latin America. This small but amazingly active center has been a leader in having Spanish accepted as an official language within PEN, and locally sponsors programs like the PEN scholarship program for San Miguel children.

San Miguel PEN presents this series of lectures to publicize and support its activities. All events are Tuesdays at 6pm in the Bellas Artes auditorium. The events start on time, tend to fill up, and finish in time for the public to make 7:30pm dinner arrangements, even if they stay to buy books after the talk. The cost is 50 pesos.

The PEN Winter Lecture Series has been going on for over 20 years and is not always a lecture. Some events are visual presentations, and one event in the upcoming series is a performance of three short plays.

The opening event on January 15 is a talk by Diana Anhalt entitled “Mexico: Haven or Last Resort.” Anhalt, who wrote A Gathering of Fugitives: American Political Expatriates in Mexico 1948-1965, is a member of a group of families who emigrated to Mexico during the McCarthy era to avoid political problems in the United States. A longtime resident of Mexico City, she will be in San Miguel for the Poetry Festival and will stay on to talk for San Miguel PEN.

On January 22, Tony Cohan, author of On Mexican Time and Mexican Days, will give a talk called “Mexico Lost and Found.” Tony, longtime chair of our Freedom to Write Committee, may be San Miguel’s best known writer/advocate. His books have been the reason many residents moved here. He has been living recently in Guanajuato and writing about that city, too.

On January 29, Gerry Helferich will talk about “High Cotton: Four Seasons in the Mississippi Delta.” Helferich is known for his work on the voyage of Baron von Humboldt in the New World; this time he has taken on the cotton industry in the southern United States.

On February 5, San Miguel author and actor Wim Coleman will direct and present three of his newest short plays in an event called “Plays on Ideas: Little Dramas, Big Themes.” Wim, with his wife Pat Perrin and their 10-year-old daughter Monse, are known to everyone who attends the San Miguel PEN series as the people who take their money at the door. They are also the coordinators of the San Miguel PEN scholarship program. 

On February 12, Joyce scholar Austin Briggs will return by popular demand to give a lecture on “The Joys of Joyce: Reading ‘The Dead.’” The day before, the Biblioteca Pública will present two showings of the movie version of this story to coordinate with the lecture.

On February 19, Lars Svanstroem will present “Day of the Dead: Ethno-history in Photos.” His photographic book Día de Muertos: De dödas i Mexiko was published in Sweden, where Svanstroem, whose wife is Mexican, is part of an association which promotes understanding of Mexican culture. Part of the book was actually written by an elder of an indigenous group in San Luis Potosí. This talk, like all talks in the PEN Winter Lecture Series, will be in English.

On February 26, Pulitzer prizewinning poet W.D. Snodgrass and his wife Kathy will present the hilarious results of their extensive research into “The Murdered Muse: The Worst Poems in English.” The field of research into terrible poems is not saturated; most of us find ourselves in it by mistake. De and Kathy have done it on purpose, and the result is great entertainment.

The last event of the 2008 series is destined to be popular. On March 4, Nick Gilman will present his new book, Good Food in Mexico, a restaurant guide to Mexico City. Gilman is the partner of Jim Johnston, whose book on walking tours in Mexico City was enormously popular in the San Miguel PEN series last year. Now they have expanded into eateries, a subject which cannot fail to attract.

There will be more information on the individual events as they approach, but meantime, mark your calendars!

Lucina Kathmann, a longtime member of San Miguel PEN, has served variously as its president, secretary and acting treasurer. As Vice President of International PEN, she travels around the world on PEN business. Her latest publications have been bilingual books for children.


PEN Winter Lecture Series
Tuesdays at 6pm
Auditorio Miguel Malo
Bellas Artes
Hernández Macías 75
50 pesos


Jan 15, Diana Anhalt, “Mexico: Haven or Last Resort”

Jan 22, Tony Cohan, “Mexico Lost and Found”

Jan 29, Gerry Helferich, “High Cotton: Four Seasons in the Mississippi Delta”

Feb 5, Wim Coleman, “Plays on Ideas: Little Dramas, Big Themes”

Feb 12, Austin Briggs, “The Joys of Joyce: Reading ‘The Dead’”

Feb 19, Lars Svanstroem, “Day of the Dead: Ethno-history in Photos”

Feb 26, W.D. and Kathy Snodgrass, “The Murdered Muse: The Worst Poems in English”

Mar 4, Nick Gilman, Good Food in Mexico

Book Fever
By Marcia Loy

Classic British mystery

Mysteries are a mind game. Lovers of the form are drawn to the puzzle. Who done it and why? Will good triumph over evil and how? In the pulse-pounding race to the solution, will the writer or the reader cross the finish line first?

—Judith Kelman

To me there’s nothing more fun than a rainy day, a pot of tea, a fire in the fireplace and a British mystery. All books mentioned in this week’s column are in the library.

Killer Dolphin, Ngaio Marsh, 1966. Marsh, a native of New Zealand, writes mysteries that feature Scotland Yard Inspector Roderick Alleyn. This entry, despite the title, doesn’t take place in Florida. The Dolphin is the name of a London theater fallen into disrepair when young Peregrine Jay discovers it. Fully restored, it becomes the setting for a play he’s written about a glove belonging to Shakespeare’s son, Hamnet. After a performance one night, there’s a murder. 

Excerpt: The first impression [of the Dolphin Theater] was dramatic. He had forgotten about the bomb damage. A long shaft of sunlight from a gap in the roof of the stage-house took him by surprise. It produced the effect of a wartime blitz drawing in charcoal and, like a spotlight, found its mark on the empty stage. There in a pool of mild sunlight, stood a broken chair still waiting, Peregrine thought, for one of Mr. Ruby’s own actors. Behind the chair lay a black patch that looked as if a paint pot had been upset on the stage.

One Across, Two Down, Ruth Rendell, 1971. Rendell, who also writes under the name Barbara Vine, is another classic British mystery writer. This book isn’t a whodunit. We learn early on who killed whom. It’s what happens afterwards that keeps the reader intrigued.

Excerpt: Four years Mother’s been here, she thought, four long years of unbroken hell. Why had she been so stupid and so impulsive as to agree to it in the first place? It wasn’t as if Maud was ill or even really disabled. She’d made a marvelous recovery from that stroke. There was nothing wrong with her but for a weakness in the left leg and a little quirk to her mouth. She was as capable of looking after herself as any woman of seventy-four. But it was no good harking back now. The thing was done, Maud’s house sold and all her furniture, and she and Stanley had got her till the day she died.

The Sign of the Four, Arthur Conan Doyle, 1890. A beautiful young woman who requests help from Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, a missing treasure, murder and Holmes’ brilliant deductive powers. A mystery from the writer who created the modern detective story.

Excerpt:…the facts are these. My father was an officer in an Indian regiment, who sent me home when I was quite a child. My mother was dead, and I had no relative in England. I was placed, however, in a comfortable boarding establishment at Edinburgh, and there I remained until I was seventeen years of age. In the year 1878 my father, who was senior captain of his regiment, obtained twelve months’ leave and came home. He telegraphed to me from London that he had arrived all safe, and directed me to come down at once, giving the Langham Hotel as his address. His message, as I remember, was full of kindness and love. On reaching London I drove to the Langham, and was informed that Captain Morstan was staying there, but that he had gone out the night before and had not returned. I waited all day without news of him. That night, on the advice of the manager of the hotel, I communicated with the police, and next morning we advertised in all the papers. Our inquiries led to no result; and from that day to this no w
ord has ever been heard of my unfortunate father. He came home, with his heart full of hope, to find some peace, some comfort, and instead—“She put her hand to her throat, and a choking sob cut short the sentence.”

Unnatural Causes, P.D. James, 1967. James has been a popular figure in British mystery for years. In this novel, Scotland Yard’s Adam Dalgliesh has gone to visit his aunt by the sea. He’s trying to decide whether he should propose to his girlfriend Deborah. But murder interferes. This has always been my favorite of her mysteries.

Excerpt: The corpse without hands lay in the bottom of the small sailing dinghy drifting just within sight of the Suffolk coast. It was the body of a middle-aged man, a dapper little cadaver, its shroud a dark pin-striped suit which fitted the narrow body as elegantly in death as it had in life. The hand-made shoes still gleamed except for some scruffing of the toe caps, the silk tie was knotted under the prominent Adam’s apple. He had dressed with careful orthodoxy for the town, this hapless voyager; not for this lonely sea; nor for his death.

The Grass Widow’s Tale, Ellis Peters, 1968. Peters is a versatile writer, perhaps most famous for mysteries involving a medieval monk, Brother Cadfael. Here she writes about a police detective’s wife. Peters is one of my favorite writers and this is one of her best.

From the first paragraph: The day before her birthday turned out to be a dead loss right from the start. It dawned reluctantly in murk, like a decrepit old man with a hangover half opening one gummy eye, to glare sickly at the world and recoil into misanthropy. Morose commuters groped their way through a gloom that did not lift. Slimy black mud picked up by the set-back heels of the new season’s shoes spatter mini-skirted legs to the thigh with miniature cow-pats, which dried greenish-grey and clung like glue. Desultory moisture in the air, balanced irritatingly between rain and mist, caused half of the hurrying morning tide to open their umbrellas, while leaving the other half unconvinced, and to walk the length of the street was to witness the formation of two inimical factions.

Next week: a look at the master of classic British mysteries, Agatha Christie. Then Book Fever will note what British mysteries others are reading. We’ll conclude January with another five classics.

Marcia Loy is a member of the steering committee of the Authors’ Sala and a volunteer at the Biblioteca Pública.

Word Watch
By Bill Gallacher

nombre (n.m) For some reason, when it comes to filling out forms, I have a problem remembering which is mi nombre and which is mi apellido. For the record, tu apellido is your surname, and tu nombre is your given name. Someone with the same nombre as you is known as tu tocayo........namesake. Grammatically speaking, nombre is the word for noun. Using a prestanombre (a name on loan, so-to-speak) is a peculiarly Mexican way of buying property when you wish to keep your ownership secret. Remember that the word for number is not nombre, but número.

obsequiar (vb) Simply, to give a present to, and synonymous with regalar. Un obsequio is a present, and a present given without any sense of toadying up to the recipient. If the idea of obsequious is to be conveyed, the adjective would be servil.

perro (n.m) You might wonder why such an everyday word as perro has been listed, but in its diminutive form perrito, the word can easily be mistaken for perito, which has an altogether different meaning. A perito is an expert, and a person often called in to give expert testimony in a dispute. If you bought a new house and part of the roof collapsed, the perito would be your man. You would be unlikely to call him “little dog,” by mistake, however, since English speakers (Scots excepted) usually have trouble rolling the Spanish “rr.”

Bill Gallacher is compiling a dictionary of Spanish words and phrases potentially confusing to English speakers. Selections will appear as a column in Atención. 

Local authors featured at Authors’ Sala
By Carol Lopes

Authors’ Sala Jim Bourque, Laura Hernández Muñoz Fri, Jan 11, 5–7pm Posada de San Francisco Plaza Principal 2, corner of  Hidalgo & San Francisco 50 pesos

Local author, Laura Hernández Muñoz

January’s Authors’ Sala presents two local authors. Come learn about healing stress and other health challenges through intuitive touch, as well as hear mystical readings and poetry derived from visits to a cemetery and other works. Come early to get a good seat.

Jim Bourque

From his entertaining and practical book, InTuiTouch, Dr. Jim Bourque Starr will explain healing through the gift of intuition and the art of touch, and how the “authentic you” is made of mind, body, spirit and emotional energy, and how that shoulder pain is connected to the responsibility of “carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders.” He will give clear and simple explanations to help you understand your current health challenges and simple steps to attain true health at the energetic and physical level, utilizing one’s intuition and own source of energy.

Dr. Bourque and his wife Araceli are recent San Miguel residents and operate a chiropractic and holistic healing center in Colonia La Lejona.

Laura Hernández Muñoz

The saying goes, “a writer is born, not made.” This is true for Laura Hernández, who from childhood demonstrated a natural interest in literary creation and painting. Embellishing short stories with drawings from her imagination, she created warrior girls, enchanted princes and mysterious witches (which she shared with her sisters and cousins). In elementary school, she found an ally in her Spanish teacher, who helped her strengthen her skills to become a writer. Reading was vital in her literary learning and through the Libro de los Niños and Tesoro de la Juventud, she entered the world of Greek mythology, Jules Verne, Victor Hugo, Charles Dickens, Fyodor Dostoyevsky and Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. Through the years, as she read new authors, Laura’s love for literature grew stronger. She earned a major in history and did an internship at the Hispanic Culture Institute of Madrid for her doctorate. After a few years, she studied parapsychology because of paranormal events experienced throughout her life.

She overcame many obstacles with tenacity and dedication on her way to becoming an accomplished writer, earning prizes as a playwright and narrator. Her first publications were influenced by human development ideas from her television show, Between Us Women. In her third book, Writing in the Dark, she decided to write an essay on her investigation of the eroticism hidden within a woman’s body.

Poetry has always been present in her narrative and in Sailors@maidmairs she dares to reproduce a love story that arises between two cybernauts in the twenty-first century, but they communicate in the old forgotten Spanish language of romanticism. Her maturity as a poet was demonstrated in her book, Phoenix, where she mastered the art of being concise. Three years passed before Laura decided to publish a new piece, since she felt her projects needed time to develop. In the most recent International Book Fair in Guadalajara, she presented her new books: Where the Nostalgia Invents the Memories, poetry in English and Spanish, and Dark Wings Angel, fantastic and mysterious tales. Laura will read from these pieces at tonight’s event.

About the Authors’ Sala:

The mission of the San Miguel Authors’ Sala is to provide visibility, community and education for writers and readers in both English and Spanish.

The Authors’ Sala presents works by writers of novels, poetry, memoirs, short stories, and nonfiction, as well as agents and editors. Additionally, it presents readings and workshops for writers and aspiring writers. Look for books by local authors in a special section in La Tienda in the Biblioteca. Visit www.authorssalasanmiguel.com  for information on upcoming events.