Mind-melding with Adela Zamudio---Bolivia's most celebrated writer

Creative flow. Translating Adela Zamudio (1854-1928), Bolivia's most celebrated writer. Her birthday, October 11th, is a national holiday. I'm fortunate to be the first translator of much of her work into English. My translation of her poem "Poeta" was published in Stanford University's issue 20 of Mantis: A Journal of Poetry, Criticism & Translation. 

Fuente Fountain Books recently published my bilingual book Adela Zamudio: Selected Poetry & Prose. I'm thrilled that the book right now is in the second round of judging for the PEN Award for Poetry in Translation!

November 30th I gave a talk (in Spanish) where I analyzed Zamudio's allegorical story "Yesterday's Meeting." (It's possible that Zamudio's story inspired George Orwell's later similar work, Animal Farm.) The Seminario Internacional Perú XIX "Autoridad, ciudadanía y cuerpos: desplazamientos y fracturas en la modernidad" in Lima Peru will have video recordings of the conference available soon on https://www.facebook.com/RielPeruXIX/videos. It was a trip for me to get up at 5 am in Portland, Oregon to present my paper via Zoom at 6 am (9 am Lima time). I love how virtual conferences let us connect with interesting folks all around the world--folks who are passionate about the same sort of stuff we care about. I enjoyed sharing a synopsis of my Reed College Master of Arts in Liberal Studies thesis, Domination and Justice in the Allegorical Story "La reunión de ayer" by Adela Zamudio (1854-1928), Bolivia.

I'm honored that in early 2023, Sinister Wisdom: A Multicultural Lesbian Literary & Art Journal will be publishing my English translation of Adela Zamudio's love poem to her sister, "Yesterday Afternoon."

I feel like I've mind-melded with Adela Zamudio. It feels deep and powerful, tender and awe-inspiring. And fun. Adela Zamudio has a great sense of humor! I hope you enjoy reading Adela Zamudio as much as I (and the many people whose praise fills the opening pages of Adela Zamudio: Selected Poetry & Prose) do.

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La creatividad fluye. Estoy traduciendo Adela Zamudio (1854-1928), la escritora más célebre de Bolivia. Su cumpleaños, el 11 de octubre, es un feriado nacional. Tengo la suerte de ser la primera traductora de gran parte de su obra al inglés. Mi traducción de su poema "Poeta" se publicó en el número 20 de Mantis: A Journal of Poetry, Criticism & Translation de la Universidad de Stanford.

Fuente Fountain Books publicó recientemente mi libro bilingüe Adela Zamudio: Selected Poetry & Prose. ¡Estoy encantada de que el libro ahora mismo esté en la segunda ronda de evaluación del Premio PEN de Poesía en Traducción!

El 30 de noviembre di una charla (en español) donde analicé el cuento alegórico de Zamudio "La reunión de ayer". (Es posible que la historia de Zamudio haya inspirado el trabajo similar posterior de George Orwell, Animal Farm). El Seminario Internacional Perú XIX "Autoridad, ciudadanía y cuerpos: desplazamientos y fracturas en la modernidad" en Lima Perú tendrá grabaciones de video de la conferencia disponibles pronto en https ://www.facebook.com/RielPeruXIX/videos. Fue dichoso levantarme a las 5 am en Portland, Oregón para presentar mi ponencia vía Zoom a las 6 am (9 am hora de Lima). Me encanta cómo las conferencias virtuales nos permiten conectarnos con personas interesantes de todo el mundo, personas apasionadas por el mismo tipo de cosas que nos importan. Disfruté compartiendo una sinopsis de mi tesis de maestría en estudios liberales de Reed College, Domination and Justice in the Allegorical Story "La reunión de ayer" by Adela Zamudio (1854-1928), Bolivia.

Me siento honrado de que a principios de 2023, Sinister Wisdom: A Multicultural Lesbian Literary & Art Journal publicará mi traducción al inglés del poema de amor de Adela Zamudio a su hermana, "Yesterday Afternoon".

Siento que me he fusionado mentalmente con Adela Zamudio. Se siente profundo y poderoso, tierno e inspirador. Y divertido. ¡Adela Zamudio tiene un gran sentido del humor! Espero que disfruten leyendo Adela Zamudio tanto como yo (y las muchas personas cuyos elogios llenan las primeras páginas del libro bilingüe Adela Zamudio: Selected Poetry & Prose).

What are U.S. Marines doing in Peru? / ¿Por que hay militares de EE.UU. en Perú?

Machu Picchu, Peru (photo ToddAdams.net)

[El castellano sigue el inglés]
There’s a theory that when U.S. mainstream news starts running stories about a foreign country, it’s because the U.S. is planning on invading that country. Since I’m a permanent resident of Bolivia, friends in the U.S. ask me what’s going on in the Andes.

They tell me that Peru has been mentioned many times recently in the U.S. news. In just the last day or so a lot of articles about Peru were in the U.S. press. Here’s a small sample: An article about food in Peru appeared in a Las Vegas newspaper. NPR reported on infant mortality in Peru. And the Washington Post ran a story about a corrupt Peruvian military official.

Friends ask me, is the U.S. preparing to invade Peru?

To try and answer their question I started asking around and keeping my eyes and ears open. At the People’s World Conference on Climate Change, which was held October 10-12 in Tiquipaya, Bolivia, I heard a Peruvian delegate say how distressing it is having U.S. soldiers in Peru.

U.S. military in Peru was news to me, so I searched online for articles. I found that, yes indeed, the U.S. has sent over 3,000 Marines to Peru, and the Peruvian people are marching in protest.

Peruvians march in protest of 3,677 US Marines entering their country. 
Photo: teleSur / Rael Mora

News agency teleSUR correspondent Rael Mora suggests that the Marines may be in Peru to destabilize democratically elected presidents in the region (such as Evo Morales, the President of neighboring Bolivia).

The teleSUR article reported that protesters “drew attention to the history of U.S. military presence and its deadly consequences, including its involvement in massacres, torture, disappearances, and other human rights abuses. Many of Peru’s more than 70,000 disappearances during the country’s so-called ‘war on terror’ counter-insurgency strategy between 1980 and 2000 have been seen as part of the U.S.-backed Operation Condor, which saw dictatorships quash rebellious voices and leftist movements throughout the continent.”

US Marines train Peruvian military to suppress citizens 
(Photo: Rob Curtis/Staff, Marine Corps Times)

The Spanish language website defensa.com, dedicated to “Armies, weapons, technology on the web,” ran a lengthy article describing the movements of the U.S. Marines in Peru.

The Marine Corps Times says that U.S. Marines are training Peruvian military to violently suppress the Shining Path, citizens who have a different vision for the people than their government does, yet have used violence in pursuit of their goals, like their government. However, a 2012 Reuter’s article reports that the Shining Path has changed its violent ways and is instead using theatre and school clubs to build solidarity among people who are harmed by neoliberal policies that make the rich richer and the poor poorer.

Members of the Movement for Amnesty and Fundamental Rights (Movadef, the political arm of Shining Path) perform a theatre play in Lima August 9, 2012. 

Photo: Reuters/Vera Lentz

The article reveals that “security documents reviewed by Reuters show the armed forces think Movadef (the political arm of Shining Path) and leftist groups have stepped up protests to sow disorder as part of a ‘common goal: vacating the presidency through a coup by the masses,’ like demonstrations that brought down leaders in Ecuador, Bolivia and Argentina over the last decade.”

Will U.S. news soon be filled with stories comparing the Shining Path to Isis, as an excuse to wage war in the land of Machu Picchu?

Do the U.S. Marines in Peru have any connection to protecting the business interests of MMG’s gigantic Las Bambas mine in Peru, to open in 2016 despite protests that left four dead and 16 seriously injured last month?

The mine, located at 4,000 metres in the south of Peru, is set to deliver 400,000 tons of 
copper per year during the first five years of production placing it within the 
top three copper mines globally (mining.com).

Time will tell.

First published as Editor's Pick "What are U.S. Marines doing in Peru?" on blogcritics.org

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¿Por que hay militares EE.UU. en Perú?

Machu Picchu, Perú (foto ToddAdams.net)

Hay una teoría de que cuando las noticias principales en los Estados Unidos empiezan a publicar artículos sobre un país extranjero, es porque los EE.UU. están planeando invadir ese país. Por que soy un residente permanente de Bolivia, amigos en los EE.UU. me preguntan lo que está pasando en los Andes.

Me dicen que el Perú ha sido mencionado muchas veces recientemente en las noticias de Estados Unidos. Por ejemplo, en el último día salió una gran cantidad de artículos sobre Perú en la prensa estadounidense. Aquí esta una pequeña muestra: Un artículo sobre la comida  en el Perú apareció en un periódico de Las Vegas. NPR informó sobre la mortalidad infantíl en el Perú. Y el Washington Post publicó una historia acerca de un oficial militar peruana corrupta.

Los amigos me preguntan, ¿los EE.UU. estan preparando para invadir Perú?

Para tratar de responder a la pregunta, yo empecé a mantener los ojos y los oídos abiertos. En la Conferencia Mundial de los Pueblos sobre el Cambio Climático, 10-12 octubre 2015 en Tiquipaya, Bolivia, oí una delegada peruana decir lo doloroso que es tener los soldados estadounidenses en el Perú.

Militares estadounidenses en el Perú era una sorpresa para mí, así que buscó en línea para artículos. Me encontré que los EE.UU. han enviado más de 3.000 soldados al Perú, y el pueblo peruano esta marchando en protesta.

Peruanos marchan en protesta por 3.677 militares estadounidenses que entran en su país. Foto: teleSUR / Rael Mora

Agencias de noticias teleSUR corresponsal Rael Mora sugiere que los militares estadounidenses  pueden estar en Perú para desestabilizar presidentes elegidos democráticamente en la región (como Evo Morales, el Presidente de Bolivia).

El artículo teleSUR informó que los manifestantes "llamaron la atención sobre la historia de la presencia militar estadounidense y sus consecuencias mortales, incluyendo su participación en masacres, torturas, desapariciones y otros abusos contra los derechos humanos. Muchos de más de 70.000 desapariciones en el Perú durante la llamada "guerra contra el terror" la estrategia de contrainsurgencia del país entre 1980 y 2000 han sido vistos como parte de la Operación Cóndor, respaldo de Estados Unidos, que vieron dictaduras acallar voces rebeldes y movimientos de izquierda de todo el continente ".

Militares estadounidenses entrenan a militares peruanos para atacar los ciudadanos (Foto: Rob Curtis / Personal, Marine Corps Times)

El sitio web en español defensa.com, dedicada a "Los ejércitos, las armas, la tecnología en la web," corrió un largo artículo que describe los movimientos de los infantes de marina de Estados Unidos en el Perú.

El Marine Corps Times dice que los marines estadounidenses están entrenando militares peruanos para reprimir violentamente a Sendero Luminoso, los ciudadanos que tienen una visión diferente para la gente que su gobierno, y han utilizado la violencia para alcanzar sus objetivos, al igual de su gobierno. Sin embargo, el artículo 2.012 de la Reuter informa que Sendero Luminoso ha cambiado sus maneras violentas y en su lugar se utiliza el teatro y clubes universitarias para construir la solidaridad entre las personas que sufren por las políticas neoliberales que hacen los ricos más ricos y los pobres más pobres.

Miembros del Movimiento a la Amnistía y Derechos Fundamentales (Movadef, la brasa política del Sendero Luminosa) presentan una obra del teatro en Lima 9 de agosto 2012.
Foto: Reuters/Vera Lentz 

El artículo revela que los "documentos de seguridad revisados por Reuters muestran las fuerzas armadas piensan Movadef (el brazo político del Sendero Luminoso) y los grupos de izquierda han intensificado las protestas para sembrar el desorden, como parte de un objetivo común: la desocupación de la presidencia mediante un golpe de Estado por el masas como manifestaciones que provocaron la caída de los líderes en Ecuador, Bolivia y Argentina en la última década".

¿Van a llenar pronto las noticias estadounidenses con artículos que comparan Sendero Luminoso a Isis, como una excusa hacer la guerra en la tierra de Machu Picchu?

¿Los militares de los Estados Unidos en Perú tiene alguna conexión con la protección de los intereses comerciales de gigantesca mina Las Bambas de MMG en el Perú, para abrir en 2016 pese a las protestas que dejaron cuatro muertos y 16 heridos graves el mes pasado?

La mina, ubicada a 4.000 metros en el sur de Perú, está configurado para entregar 400.000 toneladas de cobre por año durante los primeros cinco años de producción colocándolo dentro de los tres principales minas de cobre a nivel mundial (mining.com).

El tiempo dirá. 

Book Review: Lucy Plays Panpipes for Peace

Book review by guest blogger, Tantra Bensko
Lynette Yetter’s novel draws from her own life when she went to the Andes, pulled by the sound of the panpipes as a tool for transformation. Yet it is fiction, in the way called for in David Shields’ Reality Hunger. It means more knowing she really did something truly audacious and death defying. Here, we get a glimpse of how close to reality it is, and how the fiction made it into the powerful book it is.

“Hurtling through space and time, the blue orb was rapidly self-destructing. Vital fluids pumped out of its innards burned in orgies of greed. The vapors ate away its luminous ozone skin.

Indigenous Elders, you might call them brain cells of wisdom, were ignored.

New synapses of fiber optic cable and satellite rays rationalized the destruction as ‘progress.’

Chaos surged like a flooding river.”

Thus begins the story in which Lucy goes to participate in the ancient culture of the Andes.

Her words continue to swell when she extends her viewpoint outward, such as “Each person, a black-clad spark of soul, pulled by the inexorable gravity of survival. Together the seething mass of humanity ran. In their black mourning clothes, they were like primordial darkness churning. The light of humanity in their hearts bound each to the other as if to birth a new galaxy of life, in Warrior Town.”

It’s obvious Lynette knows how to write powerfully. I also appreciate how real and down-to-earth the language is, how honest and wholesome this book. It’s hip in a DIY kind of way, with Lynette doing a tour on bike for this book as activism inspiring others to follow their dreams and stand up for peace, and play. It also is a great example of what David Shields call for in his manifesto Reality Hunger, which is taking the world by storm now. Lynette Yetter’s Lucy feels real, and the events occurred in the way that anything occurs in our memories—as fiction–stories we’ve told ourselves repeatedly and bundled into plot packages.

One of the things I like best is that she includes the vantage point of manifesting and finding our future—and doesn’t just include the times her intentions worked. Her idealism, naïve ideas of the simplicity of finding her heart’s desire are sweet, and ironic when faced with reality. She manages to keep her humor about the ups and downs that causes, though she feels such things very passionately, and they can shake her. Her naïve idealistic determination makes her follow the sound of pan pipes to Peru, where she plays in various venues, joining in with indigenous musicians, as she believes the sound can help create visions of harmony for others as it did for her. She believes she can make a difference to bring more peace to this world through them. But it’s just that quality, and her passionate empathy and love, that create the inspiring events of this book.

Lucy takes on oppression and segregation, pointing out the false flag of 911, the cultural imperialism of missionaries, the modern tendency to block people out of simply going out and camping under the stars, and she wonders at anomalies of government/military connections. In South America, she plays indigenous peasant music only recently made legal, and has no trouble associating with citizens  in the Andes who disrespect unfair political authority, and encourages harmony in dangerous situations. Even in competitive traditions she fosters a sense of oneness.

She acknowledges how magical the world is through synchroncities such as running into the man who wrote a song she was playing. Yet, this isn’t a treatise on creative visualization. The irony that can undercut such magic becomes obvious when she gets to know the song’s author. I love that combination. She’s not living out some formula, pretending it always works. So, when her intentions do manifest, her visions do come true, they are far more believable and powerful.

We learn about Andean folklore, such as the respectful relationship of miners to the Tios, earth spirits who live underground. We also learn that kusillos are androgynous entities who bridge the known and unknown.  And we follow closely: shocking international business practices, the role of civil disobedience in social progress, and the involvement of the U.S. in civil war. This book made me cry for a long time, tremble, and even shout out loud.

David Shields would like her book. In his, Reality Hunger, which also came out in 2010, he claims “Most, perhaps even all, good work (or, okay, work that excited me) eludes easy generic classification: once we know it’s coloring entirely within the lines called 'novel' or 'memoir' or 'Hollywood movie,' I honestly don’t see how anything emotionally or intellectually interesting can happen for the reader. . . . Just as out-and-out fiction no longer compels my attention, neither does straight-ahead memoir.”

I asked Lynette about the fiction/memoir interface: “My book and reality. It is heavily based on my own personal experience in Peru and Bolivia.

In order to better tell the Truth, to express Reality, I chose to fictionalize my experiences. As an old hiking buddy and PhD in English once told me — fiction is where we express the deeper truths of life. In short, she said, ‘Fiction rocks!’ Lucy Plays Panpipes for Peace started out as pure memoir — emails sent to friends and first person stories I told at performance spaces in Los Angeles.

But, it was too limiting to stick to chronological events and specific people.

By fictionalizing reality I can lump many people into a single character who then becomes an archetype. And in that process, new characters – 100% fictitious – are sometimes born. My favorite is Aunt Bert.

Aunt Bert came to me in a vision, you might say. I was riding in a bus along the shores of Lake Titicaca, when suddenly Aunt Bert appeared in my mind. She told me her life story. As I looked out the bus window at the scenery passing by, I was so moved by her life that I even cried at the sad parts. And when I got to where I was going, I wrote down what she had told me. That is how Aunt Bert came to be in the book.

Speaking of reality – to me, Aunt Bert is one of the most real characters in the novel – yet she is 100% fictitious.

Reality is so multi-dimensional. On one hand, it is the material world we can document with calendars and cameras and weights and measures. Yet it is also the invisible realm of the mysterious that animates all of life – is life. By fictionalizing the material world, I strive to reveal the deeper truths of what is invisible yet is the most powerful truth of all – our own lives.”

David Shields asks “A character is either ‘real’ or 'imaginary’?. . . . To be alive is to travel ceaselessly between the real and the imaginary, and mongrel form is about as exact an emblem as I can conceive for the unresolvable mystery at the center of identity.”

I can feel this book in my heart. I know Lynette bravely accomplished the amazing feats in this story, yet it isn’t a heavy handed recitation of her travels, or an SGI tract, but a call to go into our deepest selves, to cry, because there is a reality there that the fictionalization allows to live in a moving way, inside of us. There is no boundary between story and life, Lucy and Lynette, or our hands, wet with tears, and the pages they turn, which catch the light of the sun, that is not separable from the light of consciousness.

Fat Old Lady Bicycles West Coast Book Tour to Inspire You to Live Your Dreams

(Thank you Seattle Post Intelligencer, for running this article!)
Wow. It looks like I may be the first author to do her book tour by bicycle (with help from public transit). In the DIY spirit of simplifying life, starting October 7, I am pedaling "Lucy Plays Panpipes for Peace, a novel" from Vancouver, BC, Canada to Southern California in order to inspire people to live their dreams. The calendar of appearances is on www.musicandes.com.
Musicians have also been Going Green and bicycling across the country. In 2006 the Ditty Bops bicycled their tour. Rocker Attica! Attica! did his Ditch the Van Bike Tour for Charity in 2009. Now Ben Sollee has strapped his cello to his bicycle and is pedaling from gig to gig. He has a sponsor to help video and promote his work. That's great!

Anyone want to sponsor me?

Living our dreams can be scary business.

Sometimes I get nervous and even freeze in fear at what I am attempting. After all, I'm not a young rocker or a young cellist guy. I am a lone woman over 50 years old and fat. Maybe even obese (isn't that an ugly word?). But, hey, I already have followed the sound of the panpipes to the Andes, seeking the ideal society of which they sing, and wrote a novel about it. There were lots of scary moments in that journey, too. Don't believe me? Just check out the Warrior Town chapter of Lucy Plays Panpipes for Peace.


When I freeze, I just make myself do something — like Daisaku Ikeda says — and take action. I answer the next email confirming a gig, pack the next box, chant nam myoho renge kyo and the fear passes. And then enthusiasm builds.

From South America I fly into San Francisco, in order to visit friends, pick up my bicycle and attend the 50-year anniversary celebration of SGI Buddhist leader Daisaku Ikeda's first visit to the Americas. Then I pedal to the Amtrak station, try out my new toolkit to disassemble my bike and put it in a box as I board the train to Vancouver for the October 7 presentation at Simon Fraser University, then on to Seattle, Oregon, and California.

Part of living simply, for me, is to not buy more stuff than I need. So, I am not buying panniers for my bicycle, or a bike trailer or anything like that. I will bungee cord my old backpack onto the rack and pedal to the next venue, carrying all my gear, books and musical instruments to present "Lucy Plays Panpipes for Peace, a novel" to inspire people to live their dreams. I hope to see you soon at one of the events! The calendar is constantly being updated on www.musicandes.com.









Article first published as Fat old lady bicycles West Coast Book Tour to inspire you to live your dreams on Blogcritics.