In Search of Mary Low Book Launch: Reading in English, Spanish and French
Join us in celebrating the life and work of surrealist poet Mary Low, with a reading in Spanish, English, and French presented by Helga Silva, Mary s daughter. In Search of Mary Low represents the first complete collection of Mary Low’s published poetry (1939–2000), edited and translated by the eminent Cuban-American
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scholar, poet, and literary critic Enrico Mario Santí. By attending or participating in this program, you agree to abide by our Community Agreement. About the Poet Mary Stanley-Low (1912-2007), a consummate British subject, surrealist poet and artist who lived most of her life among Cubans, was also a poet and revolutionary who wrote against the background of civil war in Spain, fascism in Europe, revolution in Cuba and, ultimately, Cold War Miami. Her landmark 1937 Red Spanish Notebook: The First Six Months of the Revolution and the Civil War, co-authored with her first husband, Juan Brea Landestoy, chronicled the couple’s disillusion with the war and stands as an unacknowledged precursor to Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia (1939). Low’s other writings—seven poetry books, a second collection of essays, two novels, several textbooks—though objects of praise among surrealist literati, remain in relative obscurity. Indeed, an enigmatic and non- canonical figure, Low has been the subject of cult-like homages but, surprisingly, no book-length discussion. We have a few treatments of her activism, her moving multilingual surrealist poetry, or glimpses of her unusual artwork. Her commitment, in equal measure, to social justice and poetry have earned her, over the years, glowing admiration as a woman who broke into realms reserved for men. Yet she remains a largely unheard voice.