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Poetry and tango music combined Wednesday night as part of the Macondo Writers Workshop.
July 30, 2009 ·Fans of the tango and of poetry enjoyed two feasts for the ears Wednesday night at Our Lady of the Lake University.
The San Antonio group Viva Tango shared the stage with writers invited by Sandra Cisneros to come to San Antonio.
“This is part of our Macondo writers workshop. Macondo is a group of professional writers who come from across the country,” said Cisneros.
“They come from underserved communities. We come to critique each others work and make each other better writers. We do this in the day, but at night, we want to give something back to the community, so we have the performances so the community can come and hear us, and that we can have fun,” she said.
Last night’s performance spotlighted the works of internationally acclaimed poet and activist Marjorie Agosin.
Agosin’s family was forced to flee the Nazi Holocaust in Europe, and then, as a child, she fled Chile with her family during the rise of dictator Augusto Pinochet.
The loss of homeland and being in exile has become a hallmark of Agosin’s writing.
“When I left Chile, I was 15 years old, and I felt I became a displaced immigrant, even though I was born in the U.S. It didn’t matter to me. I loved my home and family language,” said Agosin.
"Almost all of my writing deals with the theme of home, the loss of home and the recovery of home through literature,” she said.
Agosin said the pulse of the tango music compliments the words of the poets.
"Tango music is about love. It’s about unrequited love. I think everyone is a romantic somehow, and it is a very romantic music but about unfulfilled love, and everyone has had an unfulfilled love,” said Agosin.
Macondo continues tonight and Friday night with music and poetry. |
