No bidders for Neruda letters

22 June 2004

MADRID – There were no bidders for an important set of correspondence by Chilean poet  Pablo Neruda at an auction in Madrid, it was reported Tuesday. 

The collection included handwritten and typed letters, photographs, telegrams and drawings for fellow poets and journalists, which had a starting price of EUR 60,000 (USD 72,600).

During the auction at Duran’s auction house in Madrid, a private buyer acquired a first edition copy of the Nobel laureate’s “Veinte poemas de amor y una cancion desesperada” (Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair) published in 1924 in Chile, for EUR 4,000 (USD 4,840).

The starting price was EUR 2,000  (USD 2,420).

Another private collector likewise paid EUR 4,000 for a signed 1950 first edition copy of “Canto General” (General Song), with illustrations by Mexican painters Diego Rivera and David A. Siqueiros, and a photograph of Neruda signing copies of his book. The starting price was also EUR 2,000 .

The lot of Neruda’s letters and papers for which nobody bid included signed letters by the poet to Hernan Diaz Arrieta   Angel Cruchaga and Enrique Fajardo in which he details, among other topics, his financial difficulties, and sends congratulations, poems and little drawings to his friends.

The Duran auction house placed 69 lots relating to Neruda on the bidding block on the centenary of the Chilean author’s birth.

“La Cancion de Fiesta,” which he published when he was just 17, fetched EUR 1,600 (USD 1,935).

Another bidder bought “Las uvas y el viento” (The Grapes and The Wind) for EUR 600 (USD 725), double the starting price.

The book includes a handwritten verse and is also signed by the poet.

[Copyright EFE with Expatica]

Subject: Spanish news