Viva Hay! Celebrating the best of Latin American literature at celebrated literary festival

The best of contemporary Latin American poetry and two of the finest living Latin American writers will feature at this year’s Hay Festival, in events curated by the University’s Director of Creative Writing.

Following his major anthology of Contemporary Latin America, Professor Richard Gwyn is joined by Argentinian writer Andrés Neuman and Welsh poet Clare Potter for The Other Tiger. The poet and writer is Professor of Creative Writing at the University’s School of English, Communication and Philosophy.

Translated into English by Gwyn, the poems selected in The Other Tiger celebrate the individual and engage with the consequences of living under dictatorship in South America and under the threat of ‘narco’ gang violence in Mexico, succeeding in conjuring both big landscapes and moments of tenderness. In this special event, audiences will be treated to selected poems, read by Gwyn, Neuman and Potter.

In Gabo & Bolaño, a trio of leading contemporary writers from across Latin America are gathered to discuss the acclaimed work of the late, great Gabriel García Márquez and Roberto Bolaño.

Acclaimed writer and journalist from Colombia, Nobel Laureate García Márquez is perhaps best known for One Hundred Years of Solitude, and remains the best known and loved of all the Latin American writers of the ‘Boom’ period. Chilean novelist and short-story writer Roberto Bolaño is widely recognised as the most significant Latin American literary voice of his generation, leaving behind award-winner novels 2666 and The Savage Detectives on his death in 2003, aged just 50.

Great voices of contemporary Latin American literature Argentinian Andres Neuman, Carolina Sanin of Colombia and Mexican Juan Villoro will discuss the impact of these two masters, with poet, novelist and translator Richard Gwyn as chair.

Professor Gwyn said: “Having the opportunity to share some of the wonderful poems in The Other Tiger with Clare Potter and Andrés Neuman will offer a chance to celebrate the truly collaborative nature of world literature; and on this, the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of One Hundred Year of Solitude, it is timely to reconsider Gabo’s legacy alongside that of Roberto Bolaño, who himself joined the halls of the truly outstanding writers, even before his early death. In this respect we are lucky to have with us Neuman and Villoro, who knew Bolaño personally, and who can help shed light on his legacy.”

The Other Tiger with Andres Neuman, Clare E Potter and Richard Gwyn takes place on Friday 2 June at 7pm in the Cube (limited number of tickets, £7.30).

Gabo & Bolaño features in the twentieth anniversary of the celebrated literary festival on Saturday 3 June on the Baillie Gifford Stage at 10am (limited number of tickets, £7.30).