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In this paper, I analyze Octavio Paz's theoretical and political thought vis-à-vis his view of the poet as a member of an exclusive brotherhood. By tracing the displacement of Paz's thought from philosophical discourse toward literary language and poetic expression, I establish how (in opposition to Hegel's dialectic) Paz defined poetry and the poetic experience as superior forms of knowledge that could serve as the foundation for a poets' brotherhood, as well as being the ideal cognitive instruments with which to think about the origin of community at large and to develop a subversive critique of it. I trace Paz's evolving view of the decline of both the poets' brotherhood and the subversive power of poetry during the twentieth century, as he grappled with the profound transformations in language and communications provoked by the development of technology. I examine this transition in his thinking, which occurred between the first and second editions of El arco y la lira, to discuss the trajectory that guided him to the position that he assumed as an intellectual when he finally returned to Mexico in 1971. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Juan Gelmans declared affinities with the Spanish mystic poets or with Sephardic texts, along with the titles of collections such as Traducciones, Notas, and Citas y comentarios, underscore the significant presence of the written tradition in his poetics. In this essay, however, I argue for the importance of the oral tradition in arriving at a fuller understanding of Gelmans work. Many of Gelmans poems have their roots in ancient expressive modes that connect poetry to song, lamentation, incantation or curse, modes that often operate in ways distinctfivm those of the written word. This line of inquiry leads us to reflect on oral poetry as a verbal act more commonly associated with a public voice than with a private one, given that orality implies by definition a communal exchange. In this paper I examine two particular manifestations of the oral tradition, the charm and the lament, in order to explore the complex relationships between orality and writing, and by extension, between the intimate and the communal voice in Gelmans work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]