Juan Sánchez Peláez (September 25, 1922 in Altagracia de Orituco, Guárico – November 20, 2003 in

Caracas Caracas ( , ), officially Santiago de León de Caracas (CCS), is the capital and largest city of Venezuela, and the center of the Metropolitan Region of Caracas (or Greater Caracas). Caracas is located along the Guaire River in the northern p ...

) was a

Venezuela Venezuela, officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many Federal Dependencies of Venezuela, islands and islets in the Caribbean Sea. It com ...

n poet and National Prize winner for Literature in 1975.

Biography

Juan Sánchez Peláez was born in Altagracia de Orituco but his family soon moved to Caracas, where he attended primary and secondary schools. He attended university in Santiago,

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in western South America. It is the southernmost country in the world and the closest to Antarctica, stretching along a narrow strip of land between the Andes, Andes Mountains and the Paci ...

where he befriended the poets of the surrealist group Mandrágora. He published his first poems in their magazine and it was through this encounter that his lifelong interest in surrealism began. Upon returning to Caracas, he published ''Elena y los elementos'' in 1951. ''Elena y los elementos'' had a profound effect on Venezuelan poetry, outlining a distinctly Venezuelan form of surrealism that influenced the generation of avant-garde poets who emerged in the 1960s. This book was published in a fiftieth anniversary edition by Monte Ávila Editores after he was awarded the title of Doctor Honoris Causa from the Universidad de los Andes in Mérida in 2001. He worked as a teacher in

Maturín Maturín () is a city in Venezuela, the capital of the Venezuelan state of Monagas and a centre for instrumental exploration and development of the petroleum industry in Venezuela. The metropolitan area of Maturín has a population of 401,384 inha ...

Maracaibo Maracaibo ( , ; ) is a city and municipality in northwestern Venezuela, on the western shore of the strait that connects Lake Maracaibo to the Gulf of Venezuela. It is the largest city in Venezuela and is List of cities in Venezuela by population ...

and the state of

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. He was cultural attache to the Embassy of Venezuela in

Colombia Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north, Venezuel ...

. He also lived in

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and Madrid. In 1969 he was a Fellow at The University of Iowa's International Writing Program, after which he lived in New York City for two years. Sánchez Peláez was a contributor to numerous periodicals: Papel Literario ( El Nacional),

Zona Franca A free-trade zone (FTZ) is a class of special economic zone. It is a geographic area where goods may be imported, stored, handled, manufactured, or reconfigured and re-exported under specific customs regulation and generally not subject to ...

, Eco (Colombia) Revista Poesia (Valencia), Señal (Paris), Tabla Redonda, among others. He also translated the works of American poet laureate

Mark Strand Mark Strand (April 11, 1934 – November 29, 2014) was a Canadian-born American poet, essayist and translator. He was appointed Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 1990 and received the Wallace Stevens Award in 2004 ...

from English to Spanish. The outstanding feature of his poetry is the tension between mysticism and eroticism. Sánchez Peláez always looked at his erotic objects as distant entities, separate from the mundane through the metaphysical veil. Ludovico Silva, in his "Juan Sanchez Pelaez, The real and illusionary" states:

''Juan Sánchez Peláez was the first Venezuelan poet who introduced into our poetry, consciousness of the secrecy of man in the world and his distressing certainty of being thrown into time as a foreigner, without his consent (...) His existential rebellion is a discerning attitude, a lyrical excitement, a ritual of introspection. Silent. He accepts the world but does not understand it and his flexible language, capable of expressing nuances of a visionary and deeply artistic sensibility, constitutes a renewal.''

Juan Liscano, in his ''Panorama de la Literatura actual'' (Overview of Current Literature), 1973, states: "Sánchez Peláez through his open writing and his existential attitude created a new path in our poetry." In 2022, several events were held to honor the centennial of his birth.

Family

Pelaez married American painter and sculptor Ellen Lapidus Stern and had two daughters, Tamar Meisel, a medical coach and Raquel Sanchez, an artist, and licensed social worker. Both daughters and grandchildren live in Israel. After his divorce, he married Argentinian editor Malena Coelho (1937-2022). The couple was together for over 40 years until his passing.

Works

*''Elena y los elementos'' (

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Culture, language and peoples * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England * ''English'', an Amish ter ...

: Helen and the Elements), Caracas, Tipografía Garrido, 1951, 46 pages. *''Animal de costumbre'' (English: Creature of Habit), Editorial Suma, 1959, 30 pages. *''Filiación oscura'' (English: Dark Affiliation), Caracas, Editorial Arte, 1966, 41 pages. *''Un día sea'' (English: May It Be One Day), Caracas, Monte Ávila Editores, 1969, 142 pages. *''Rasgos comunes'' (English: Common Features), Caracas, Monte Ávila Editores, 1975, 72 pages. *''Por cuál causa o nostalgia'' (English: For What Cause or Nostalgia), Caracas, Fondo Editorial Fundarte, 1981, 69 pages. *''Aire sobre el aire'' (English: Air Over the Air), Caracas, Tierra de Gracia Editores, 1989, 35 pages. *''Obra poética'' (English: Poetic Work), Barcelona, Editorial Lumen, 2004, 260 pages.

Translations

Excerpts from Creature of Habit
translated by Guillermo Parra, ''InTranslation'', ''The Brooklyn Rail'', December 2009.

translated by Guillermo Parra, ''Otoliths'', April 2010. *
Air On the Air
' Translated from Spanish by Guillermo Parra, 2016, Published by Black Square Editions

External links

Facebook tribute page

Audio of Juan Sánchez Peláez reciting his poem Animal de Costumbre

Audio of Juan Sánchez Peláez reciting Por cuál causa o nostalgia, 1981, from the book Air on the Air

Video of Juan Sánchez Peláez reciting poetry and tributes from his wife and colleagues.

Video: Juan Sánchez Peláez, ANTOLOGÍA VISUAL

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sanchez Pelaez, Juan 1922 births 2003 deaths Venezuelan male poets 20th-century Venezuelan poets International Writing Program alumni 20th-century male writers Venezuelan expatriates in Chile