Award-winning poet to speak at WestConn
Former guerilla warrior now fights with words
DANBURY, CONN. — Western Connecticut State University will host internationally acclaimed writer Otoniel Guevara as he reads his poetry and speaks about his experiences as a guerilla in El Salvador.
The presentation, “Poetry, Revolution and Memory in El Salvador,” will be entirely in Spanish. It begins at 10 a.m. on Thursday, April 3, in Room 101 of Berkshire Hall on the university’s Midtown campus, 181 White St. in Danbury. The event will be free and open to the public.
Guevara is known throughout the Americas and Europe for his expressive poetry on topics that run the gamut from love and relationships to war and politics. Much of his writing is charged with political and revolutionary themes influenced by his experiences in El Salvador.
“Guevara’s poetry illustrates the relationship among artistic expression, creativity and social change,” said Dr. Alba Skar, chair of WestConn’s world languages and literature department. “In the United States we tend to separate these aspects, but they are very much intertwined, especially in Latin America.”
Throughout the 1980s, Guevara was a member of the leftist, Farabundo Marti National Liberation (FMLN), a guerilla warfare group that fought against El Salvador’s oppressive government regime.
“He’ll be speaking specifically about the association between cultural production and historical memory in El Salvador during the time he was a revolutionary,” Skar said.
Since leaving the FMLN in 1992, Guevara has published five books of Spanish poetry. He is a founding member of two poet organizations, the Xibalba in El Salvador and the Imagen in Nicaragua. Guevara’s work has earned him several Latin American literary prizes, and he has participated in prominent international poetry events.
This is Guevara’s second visit to WestConn. In December 2006, he discussed “War, Violence and Immigration in El Salvador.”
For more information, call Skar at (203) 837-8485 or the WCSU Office of University Relations at (203) 837-8486.
