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🦋 The Christ of Elqui: "Fact" and "Fiction"

Doing a little more research about Rivera Letelier's book: I was apparently imprecise in calling it an homage to Parra's poem. It looks like both the poem and the book are based on the life of a real historical figure named Domingo Zárate Vega who preached imminent apocalypse in the Elqui Valley of the 1930's. (I am hedging a bit because I'm not finding much primary source material about Zárate Vega on the internets. But multiple pages about the book and about the poem make reference to their being based on real history. An article in the Patagonia Times states that Rivera Letelier "researched the actual existence of the Christ of Elqui for his book and includes a bibliography at the end to avoid accusations of plagiarism" -- I am not finding this bibliography in my copy, which is disappointing and confusing.)

From the same Patagonia Times article, a beautiful anecdote about how Rivera Letelier, who grew up in a lower-class family and initally worked as a miner, came to his writing career:

Rivera Letelier began to write when he was 21 years old “because of hunger.” Listening to the radio with an empty stomach, he heard the announcement of a poetry competition whose award was a dinner in a luxurious hotel. He wrote a four-page love poem and won the meal.

Update: a little information about Zárate Vega in this post from Loruka, who lives in La Serena.

posted afternoon of Wednesday, November 10th, 2010
➳ More posts about The Art of Resurrection
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I made available some Elqui Valley pics I had from a recent and way too short trip. The link should appear on Buzz.

posted morning of November 14th, 2010 by Jorge López

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