_

Ne hE ee Neh Ste

Pablo Neruda is 60—

best wishes pouring in

Pre Neruda, the great poet
of Chile and the World, is
80 years old, During the last two
Weeks, starting with hundreds of
Poetry recitals, there have been
all kinds of cultural events mark-
ing Neruda Week in Chile andthe
Whole Hispanic world, Progress-
ive writers, poets, writers and
intellectuals in the capitalist
World, and, of course, most of
the cultural figures in the socia-
list countries, have been flooding
Neruda’ s home with congratula-

tions,
*

* *

Pablo Neruda was born in Par-

Tal, Chile, on July 12, 1904,

He is the son of Rosa Basoalto,
an elementary school teacher who
died of tuberculosis one month
after his birth, and Jose del.
Carmen Reyes, a railroad work-
€r of peasant origin,

Neruda was baptized Ricardo
Eliecer Neftali Reyes Basoalto,
€ was brought up by Trinidad
Candia, his father’s second wife,

At the age of 12 or so, Neruda
dedicated his first poem to his
Step-mother, One evening after
Supper he showed it to his father,
Where did you copy this from?”
his father asked,

Neruda later wrote about his
incident: “This is the way I re-
Ceived the first distracted ex-
ample of literary criticism.”

To hide his identity from his
father, who did not seem to ap-
Prove of things poetical, the young
Poet adopted the name of Pablo

eruda,

In 1921 Neruda came to San-

"ago de Chile to study, He dived
“Ito the tumultuous life of the

Chilean university student,

etry prizes and awards start-
aM Coming with the publication
°f his book “20 Poemas de Amor
Y Una Cancio Desesperada” (20
Love Poems and a Desperate

ong), Neruda became a nation-

ally recognized poet,

Honors for poetry kept mount-

| 10g, but there was not much im-
: frovement in his economic situa-

ton,
* * *
The Spanish Civil War found
€ruda serving as Chilean con-
Sul in Barcelona and other cities
2 Spain, The assassination of
is friend, the poet Garcia Lorca,

AS well as the Spanish revolution

ad a tremendous impact onhim,

-hder the daily threat of death

"om fascist bombardment in.
Shain, Neruda continued writing
Poems, editing literary maga-
Nes and publishing books be-

Pablo Neruda

sides™attending to his consular
chores, s

His book, “Espana en el Cora-
zon,” (Spain at the Heart), print-
ed in an abandoned mill on home-
made paper, was the only thing
that many of the defeated com-
batants brought with them as
they trekked across the Pyrenees
from Spain into France,

Neruda returned to Chile, In
1937 he organized the Alliance
of Intellectuals to defend hum-
anity’s cultural values and to fight
against the advance of fascism
all over Europe,

In 1944 he was elected Sena-
tor, The next year he was award-
ed the National Literary Prize,
On July 8, 1945, Pablo Neruda
joined the Communist Party of
Chile- at a mass cultural affair
held at the Municipal Theatre
in Santiago.

~ x

*
After Gonzales Videla turned
against the people who had elec-
ted him tothe presidency, Neruda
wrote his famous “Intimate Let-
ter to be Read by the Millions,”
which was published in * El Nacio-
nal” of Caracas, This indictment
of Gonzales Videla and all he
stood for was repeated almost
word for word in the Chamber of
the Chilean Senate, From then on
Neruda was a marked man,

“La Ley Maldita” (the cursed
law), a Chilean version of the
McCarran Act, was invoked
against him, thus violating his
immunity as a Senator; He had
to live in hiding for months,
moving from house to house
among friends andcomrades, and
disguising himself until he man-
aged to cross the Andes on
horseback into Argentina,

For months nobody heard a
word about Neruda, Many thought
he had fallen into the hands of
ithe police, others that he was
killed, That is why he created
quite a sensation when he appear-

ed at the first World Congress

of Partisans of Peace in Paris,

Many newsmen doubted that
the man at the Congress of Par-
tisans was really Neruda, To a
direct question by a Paris re-
porter, the Chilean poet an-
swered: “No, I am not Pablo

Neruda, but a ‘man who writes

poetry, who was born in Chile,
who struggles for beauty and
liberty and who is also named
Pablo Neruda,”

At this very moment he is
probably accompanying Dr, Sal-
vador Allende, the people’s can-
didate for president in the com-
ing Sept. 4 presidential elec-
tions, He may be reciting his
poetry in the public square of
some small town before or after
Dr, Allende’s speech to the peo-
ple. He has been reciting his
poetry to millions of Chileans
over radio and television, in
small towns and big cities,

For that is what Neruda has
pledged to doto celebrate his 60th

birthday, 3
—Jesus Colon
(U.S. Worker)

a

& 3

Robert Mitchum (left) is the defence lawyer and Keenan Wynn (second from right) the accused in “The Man

tn the Middle.”

Strong,honest plea made
for rights of individual

hen an innocent manisfram-
ed in court the issue is
simple, We know exactly where
our sympathies lie. But man in
the middle — based on How
ard Fast’s “The Winston Affair:
— involves us in a far knottier
alignment of sympati‘as,
This serious and gripping
drama forces us to consider what
rights are due to a fascist-mind-

ed American officer who has’

brutally murdered a British sol-
dier in front of 11 witnesses,
with no apparent motive.

The murder is committed to-
ward the end of the war, when
feeling between British and Am-
erican troops stationed in India
is running so high that it is
seriously endangering military
progress,

The senior American officers
are determined to have the guilty
man executed. .They are not,
however, concerned with justice,
but with military expediency.

They are prepared to go to
any lengths to achieve a quick
trial, a semblance -of fair play,

and a death sentence. This, they _

believe, is essential for British-
American unity in the forthcom-
ing offensive.

The Waterhouse and Hall
script, and Keenan Wynn’s razor-
sharp characterization, leave us
in no doubt that everything the
murderer stands for iscontemp-
tible and vicious.

But still — says the film — he
has the same rights as every-
one else; the right, above all, to
a fair trial.

The director, Guy Hamilton,

controls the balance of argument
to great effect so that at any
one time we can see all round
the “ifs” and “buts” of the prob-
lem.

It is through the “man in the
middle” — the high-ranking offi-
cer appointed as defence counsel
for the sake of appearances —
that some sort of basic human
principle begins to emerge,

Robert Mitchum, despite his
irritating air of worldy-wisdom
even at the extreme point of
doubt, handles this key role very
soundly.

As an army career man, his
thinking runs at first along the

well-worn lines of duty, obedi-
ence, rank and promotion.

Purely as a matter of legai
form, he looks into the possibili-
ty of pleading “guilty butinsane.”

When his path is blocked by
the top brass every time he
makes the simplest investiga-
tions in this direction his hackles
begin to rise. He finds himself
confronted by basic moral con-
siderations.

It’s a pity that so much of his
chang. of outlook is due to the
woman in the picture, for none
of the love-stuff rings true or has
any direct bearings on the argu-
ment.

France Nuyen, as the nurse
who keeps him warm at night, is
a plummy lass; but she is given
some very fey and shimsy things
to say. é

Trevor Howard, as a boozy
British psychiatrist, brightens
up the screen whenever he ap-
pears, and his more sober- mind-
ed American counterpart is well
Played by Sam Wanamaker,

The film leans rather heavily
on this psychiatry angle, and the
insanity plea begs a lot of ques-
tions.

Dramatically, too, the prison-
er’s final revelation of his own
insanity comes over like one of
those last-minute Perry Mason

. confessions, ;

But it remains a tense and
absorbing production with strong

France Nuyen is the woman in 24 honest feelings for the rights
the picture with some “whimsy” Of the individual.

dialogue.

—Nina Hibbin

Metro plans bigger year

ancouver’s Metropolitan Co-

operative Theatre Society,
more popularly known as Metro
Theatre Centre or simply Metro
Theatre, is now located in its
new permanent home at 1370
S.W, Marine Drive,

General Manager Gordon
Smith, Operations Manager Lloyd
Berry and secretary Miss Pat-
ricia Benson are on hand to
answer questions and take visi-
tors on a tour of the home of
the showcase for thenonprofess-
ional performing arts inthe Low-
er Mainland of B.C,

Response from last year’s
membership has exceeded all
expectations with applications of

over 50 percent already heard
from,

Individual membership for the
1964-65 season ranges from $15
to $33.75, and provides one seat

DRAMA

to a total of 15 top local stage
shows, including 12 selected
plays and three special produc-
tions — one of which will be
Gilbert and Sullivan’s “The Mik-
ado,”

Membership is available on an
instalment payment plan, For

?

further
266-7191,

This year, Metro will be hold-
ing a Concert Series, beginning
on October 11, The concerts will
be held on alternate: Sundays,
Auditions will be conducted in
the new theatre on the following
dates:

information phone

Sunday, August 16, singers —
classical and semi-classical;
Wednesday, August 19, singers
— popular and folk; Saturday,
August 22, instrumentalists —
classical and modern: Sunday,
August 23, instrumentalists —
jazz; Wednesday, August 26,
dancers — ballet and modern;
Saturday, August 29, singers —
all types,

August 21, 1964—PACIFIC TRIBUNE—Page 9