Wednesday, March 26 2025, 4 - 5pm Gilbert Hall, Room 116 Critics of José Watanabe’s poetry (Peru, 1945) have emphasized two key points in his poetic praxis: on the one hand, the body as a material space where poetry happens and where reality cannot be represented entirely by language (Vich 2010); on the other hand, his Japanese haiku tradition has been emphasized as a direct influence on his poetry (Chirinos, Favela). Building up on these approaches, Willson Center Distinguished Lecturer Carlos Villacorta analyzes the relationship established between the body as an individual and the body as a nation that Watanabe depicts throughout his poetry. Critics have pointed out how the poet uses animals as metaphors for the ungraspable materiality of nature or poetry. However, there is also the theme of the homeland-nation-body explicit in Watanabe's poetry, especially in the books “Antígona” (2000) and “Habitó entre nosotros” (2002), books written after the Armed Conflict in Peru. Watanabe writes how the individual body, subject to violence, establishes its relationship with the Peruvian nation and state to expand the concept of nation and citizenship. Eighty years after his birth, José Watanabe's poetry continues to challenge us as a society that seeks to recover from the trauma of violence. Co-sponsors: Willson Center for Humanities and Arts; Department of Romance Languages; LACSI
