Read the World: Uruguayan Women Poets

It is high time Americans start listening to and understanding “voices beyond the borders of the United States” — that’s the driving sentiment behind this bilingual poetry reading. UW creative writing professor emerita Jesse Lee Kercheval hosts this event with a focus on Uruguayan women poets. Uruguayan poets Silvia Guerra and Silvia Goldman will be joined by translators and poets including Erika Meitner, Mary Hawley, Catherine Jagoe, Jeannine Pitas, Sarli Mercado, Lori DiPrete Brown and others, who will read work in translation from the new anthology of 55 Uruguayan women poets, Flores raras [Escondido país]. Uruguayan wine and food follows.

media release: Join us for a special bilingual poetry reading, Read the World: Uruguayan Women Poets, on Wednesday, October 23 at 7:00pm. Free admission, donations encouraged.

Now, more than ever, it is important to hear voices beyond the borders of the United States. Jesse Lee Kercheval will host this bilingual Spanish-English celebration of Uruguayan women poets, featuring Silvia Guerra and Silvia Goldman. A chorus of translators and poets including Erika Meitner, Mary Hawley, Catherine Jagoe, Jeannine Pitas, Sarli Mercado, Lori DiPrete Brown and others will read work in translation from the new anthology of 55 Uruguayan women poets, Flores raras [Escondido país], that showcases this unique, long and unbroken tradition. We’ll end the night with Uruguayan wine and food.

Silvia Goldman (1977, Montevideo, Uruguay) is the author of the poetry collections Cinco movimientos del llanto (Hermes Criollo), De los peces la sed (Pandora Lobo Estepario), miedo (Axiara ediciones), árbol y otras ansiedades (Isla Negra), Ese eco que une los ojos and Voz hasta el principio (Editorial Efímera). Her poems have been translated into English, Italian, Portuguese, Arabic, Bengali, Hebrew, Bosnian, and Finnish She holds a Ph.D. in Hispanic Studies from Brown University and teaches at DePaul University in Chicago.

Silvia Guerra (1961, Maldonado, Uruguay) is author of 12 books including Pulso, (Editorial Amargord, Madrid, 2011) and Todo comienzo, lugar, (Editorial Casa Vacía, Richmond, Virginia, 2016). She is the co-editor of the anthology of Uruguayan women poets Flores raras [Escondido país] (Dialogos Books, 2024). Her bilingual collection, Un mar en madrugado/ A Sea at Dawn, translated by Jesse Lee Kercheval and Jeannine M. Pitas, was published by Eulalia Books in 2023. She is a member of the executive board of the Mario Benedetti Foundation.

Jesse Lee Kercheval is a poet, writer, visual artist and translator. Her most recent poetry collections are I Want to Tell You (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2023) and Un pez dorado no te sirve para nada/ A Goldfish Buys You Nothing (Editorial Yaugurú, Uruguay, 2023). Her translations include Love Poems by Idea Vilariño and The Invisible Bridge: Selected Poems of Circe Maia (University of Pittsburgh Press). She is the Zona Gale Professor Emerita of English at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.