Xavier Martin | Valparaíso (Chile), (EFE).- The Spanish poet Luis García Montero, director of the Cervantes Institute, warned of the danger of replacing culture with entertainment, which makes societies more manipulable, and defended political activism and social commitment from poetry as did Pablo Neruda, whom he considers a current reference.
In an interview with EFE in La Sebastiana, the Chilean poet’s home in Valparaíso, García Montero also spoke of the need to fight against xenophobia, to create spaces for dialogue that integrate minorities, to unite in the Spanish language and to consolidate the progressive governments that emerged in Latin America.
“When culture is being replaced by entertainment, when education and the formation of consciences go to a second level, it is much easier to manipulate an uneducated person than an educated person. And in addition, there are very powerful means of controlling consciences in the entire digital transformation ”, she pointed out.
“Digital transformation can bring many things. Welcome be. But like any historical transformation, we also see that it has its shadow and there are those who can use it to inform, to communicate but also to manipulate consciences”, he explained.
“And in a society that is also very fast, the power of manipulation and lies is withering and more than generating knowledge, it generates hatred,” he insisted.
social commitment
Regarding the Chilean poet, whom he recognized as one of his influences, García Montero highlighted his social commitment, the solidarity he had with the Spanish exiles, his criticism of Stalinism and Castroism, and the lucidity that led him to occupy “an important place in the international commitment of the left.
“I also believe that Neruda is a poet who has taught us to dialogue between the self and social commitment, between the self and us, the self and society. And he has been very vigilant.”
“For me that is a great lesson, to think about us,” he added.
“The truth is that poetry is the deepest way we have of saying what I say when I say it’s me. And when I say it’s me, I’m not talking about an isolated thing, I’m talking about a person who was born in a society that has formed their identity in a language”, she argues.
“In that sense, everything is political. What worries me is the people who want to despise politics by saying you don’t have to do politics, because they identify it with corruption, with sectarianism, with manipulation, with impurity. This dynamic, what it does is leave the hands free to the strongest and not to the illusion of building a common space in which to live together ”, he pointed out.
A social space that, in his opinion, is the place where more just and egalitarian societies are built, because otherwise “we always end up in the hands of the most powerful, confusing freedom with the law of the strongest.”
“It seems to me that this is a lesson that should never be forgotten. I am very concerned when the common good is a space that does not invite coexistence, respect for diversity, but is filled with sects that fight for their own one-dimensional vision of the world and forget the common song of commitment to building a future. fairer,” he reiterated.
A common space in Spanish
In line with this necessary interculturality, García Montero points out the Spanish republican exile, which “humanly transformed countries like Mexico, like Argentina, like Chile, because they enriched those who gave them hospitality humanely with their professions, with their work, with their hearts.”
“When people from outside Spain now arrive, what they do is enrich us humanly and it is very good that borders are overcome by what we now call interculturality. Human beings are more important than any closed identity, ”she argued.
In this sense, he encouraged “celebrating the strength of a Latin American and Hispanic American community made up of more than 500 million native speakers” because “any country will have much more strength if it consolidates the community of our culture, of our language, than by going separately” .
“It seems to me that what unites us is culture and language. From there, what I ask of Europe is that it please defend the values of the democratic tradition and human rights in the most conscious and possible way”, she stressed.
“If I think of Latin America… What I hope is that all these governments that are emerging on the left and progressive are capable of maintaining their dream and doing the best they can, because we are at stake when in Europe we fight for authoritarianism, when in America we fight against the powerful elites that marginalize the people”, he concluded.