Event Type
In 1933 in Buenos Aires, the electrifying Spanish poet Federico García Lorca presented his famous lecture, “Play and Theory of the Duende.” The Duende, Lorca said, is a goblin—as distinct from an angel or a muse—which inhabits great art. But what is this goblin, and what business does it have with our poems? Lorca left us a few cryptic hints. To begin with, “The Duende … will not approach at all if he does not see the possibility of death, if he is not convinced he will circle death’s house …” Also, “intellect is oftentimes the foe of poetry because it imitates too much, it elevates the poet to a throne of acute angles and makes him forget that in time the ants can devour him, too …” In this workshop we will invite the mysterious goblin Duende for a visit.
