In these letters Paz explores “intimate feelings such as passion and desire.”
The book This letter is on your lips, presented this Tuesday at Mexico City, rescue the love letters he sent Octavio Paz in 1935 to the also Mexican writer Elena Garro, which constitute the “Most personal epistolary” of the Mexican Nobel Prize in Literature.
“In those letters you can see that he could not live without her for a single minute, he already wanted dawn to see her, he slept thinking of her, he woke up thinking of her”, the historian explained Alberto Enriquez Perea, in charge of studying the letters, at the event held in a cafe in the Mexican capital.
This letter is on your lips, published by Ediciones de Lirio, collects 23 love letters that Paz (1914-1998) sent to Garro (1916-1998) during the summer of 1935, when they began their courtship with 21 and 19 years, respectively.
The book includes both the handwritten letters and their transcription, as well as some studies on Paz y Garro, fundamental figures for the history of Mexican letters.
Young Paz’s concerns related to literature and philosophy are also addressed.
Perea explained that in those letters Paz explores “intimate feelings like passion and desire” which will later be part of his masterful poetic work.
“With Elena’s love comes all that she still lacked: her love passion”, he stressed.
“Octavio Paz’s epistolary talks to us about the public man, the intellectual, the character, but the personal epistolary is rarer. This is probably the most personal of all “, assured the essayist Jose Maria Espinasa, who prefaced the book.
The author of The Labyrinth of Solitude and the writer of The memories of the future they got married in 1937, they had a daughter, Elena Paz Garro, but they divorced in 1959 amid grudges and ended up very estranged.
Espinasa explained that the book does not include that episode, since the letters show a story that “It is not yet contaminated by daily life, time, old age and misunderstandings.”
“We all know the story of the Paz-Garro marriage and around there is very good literary research, but sometimes a lot of yellowishness and scandal-seeking”, he opined.
The co-authors of the work expressed their hope that one day the letters with which Garro responded will come to light and that they should be among Paz’s personal files. (I)
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