Pablo Neruda and Octavio Paz - Wisdom of an Urbanizing World

 

The world has changed so much over the last few centuries that if a person from even the 1800s were to suddenly be transported to the present, they would have almost no idea what they were looking at. There were a few advantages to living life in modern cities in the 1900s, but there were many who described these urban jungles as vile places that would drive people crazy. Octavio Paz, in his poem I Speak of the City, and Pablo Neruda, in his poem Walking Around, both explored this theme of how these modern cities are filled with terrible conditions that can lead people to despair and insanity.

        Pablo Neruda’s Walking Around is the more jarring of the two. Neruda describes with a  manic energy how he’s tired of being a man, how he would love to do insane things like murdering a nun, scaring a notary, or running through the streets with a knife. Surrounding his own madness, Neruda vividly describes the city as a hideous and wretched place, noting things like sulphur-colored birds and shops smelling like vinegar. He goes so far as to call himself “a root in the dark, hesitating, stretched out, shivering with dreams, downwards” (Puchner 1429) Thus, Neruda portrays that he himself has been driven to a forlorn kind of insanity because of his life in the city.

While Octavio Paz acknowledges the advantages of city life, his work I Speak of The City also depicts many of the darker undertones which make city life so unbearable, so unliveable. He  describes how new novelties are constantly built before fading into ruins, how sunlight is filtered through smog, how hospitals are always full yet people always die alone in them. Paz describes this city as “a mother who gives birth to us and devours us,” (Puchner 1423) portraying that the city, while it accomplishes some good, knaws away at peoples lives and souls. Overall, the two poets paint a gruesome picture of the modern city, and though there is some exaggeration to their poetry, it is good to acknowledge that no major metropolis is as shiny as its surface.

Many popular works seem loathe to acknowledge these darker sides of city life in reality, instead portraying the darker sides of cities using exaggerated dystopias or fantasy environments. One such fantasy portrayal of an unbearable urban environment is found in the 2020 game Bug Fables. Bug Fables, a game about exploring a world of sentient bug peoples, strikes a nice balance by being cartoony enough to not be too overwhelming while still showing some of the darknesses of an urban environment. In a game about bugs, termites are portrayed as a more urbanized species than other . The subterranean home of these termites allows their city to literally not allow a view of the sky, just as light and air pollution in heavy urban areas might similarly block out the stars.

            As the world advances faster and faster, it’s important as a writer to not shy away from the evil circumstances humanity has the potential to create for themselves. At the same time, it seems wise in new mediums like movies and video games to not be too graphic about these portrayals, so that we don’t cause torture for readers similar to the torture people in more grim environments already must endure. Paz and Neruda, in their poetry, seem to strike a balance between these concerns very well, making their readers uncomfortable enough to become well aware of the real-world problems without quite plunging their audience in head over heels.

           

Works Cited

Puchner, M. (2013). The Norton Anthology of World Literature: Volume 2. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. Retrieved from https://digital.wwnorton.com/worldlit3v2