EXQUISITE CORPSE
EXQUISITE CORPSE, the sixth poetry collection by renowned Chilean poet Malú Urriola (1967–2023), translated by Elena Barcia, showcases Urriola's intensely personal and innovative voice. Oscillating between deep self-reflection and playful Dadaist influences, these poems dive into the emotional intensity of memory—whether through vivid sexual encounters or profound personal grief—often morphing into surreal, imaginative leaps. Her work brims with allusions to music, literature, and the natural world, deeply exploring what it means to live and think as a poet in the modern world. As Urriola writes, her aim is "to navigate the instant, to delay its departure a while, fine-tuning the ear of the eye in that brief journey of presence.”
Inspired by Dadaism’s embrace of unpredictability, Exquisite Corpse breaks from traditional poetic form, blending graphics, shape poems, aphorisms, philosophical reflections, and free-form meditations on poetry itself. Her thoughts spiral and loop like jazz riffs, crafting a richly layered reading experience. Wry, intelligent, and moving, the collection delves into themes of urban life, academic arrogance, female sexuality, existentialism, and the beauty and solace found in nature, music, and poetry.
EXQUISITE CORPSE, the sixth poetry collection by renowned Chilean poet Malú Urriola (1967–2023), translated by Elena Barcia, showcases Urriola's intensely personal and innovative voice. Oscillating between deep self-reflection and playful Dadaist influences, these poems dive into the emotional intensity of memory—whether through vivid sexual encounters or profound personal grief—often morphing into surreal, imaginative leaps. Her work brims with allusions to music, literature, and the natural world, deeply exploring what it means to live and think as a poet in the modern world. As Urriola writes, her aim is "to navigate the instant, to delay its departure a while, fine-tuning the ear of the eye in that brief journey of presence.”
Inspired by Dadaism’s embrace of unpredictability, Exquisite Corpse breaks from traditional poetic form, blending graphics, shape poems, aphorisms, philosophical reflections, and free-form meditations on poetry itself. Her thoughts spiral and loop like jazz riffs, crafting a richly layered reading experience. Wry, intelligent, and moving, the collection delves into themes of urban life, academic arrogance, female sexuality, existentialism, and the beauty and solace found in nature, music, and poetry.
EXQUISITE CORPSE, the sixth poetry collection by renowned Chilean poet Malú Urriola (1967–2023), translated by Elena Barcia, showcases Urriola's intensely personal and innovative voice. Oscillating between deep self-reflection and playful Dadaist influences, these poems dive into the emotional intensity of memory—whether through vivid sexual encounters or profound personal grief—often morphing into surreal, imaginative leaps. Her work brims with allusions to music, literature, and the natural world, deeply exploring what it means to live and think as a poet in the modern world. As Urriola writes, her aim is "to navigate the instant, to delay its departure a while, fine-tuning the ear of the eye in that brief journey of presence.”
Inspired by Dadaism’s embrace of unpredictability, Exquisite Corpse breaks from traditional poetic form, blending graphics, shape poems, aphorisms, philosophical reflections, and free-form meditations on poetry itself. Her thoughts spiral and loop like jazz riffs, crafting a richly layered reading experience. Wry, intelligent, and moving, the collection delves into themes of urban life, academic arrogance, female sexuality, existentialism, and the beauty and solace found in nature, music, and poetry.
Playlist for EXQUISITE CORPSE
About MALÚ URRIOLA
Malú Urriola was a Chilean poet, author of seven collections of verse, and the winner of numerous awards, including the Fundación Pablo Neruda’s Premio a la Trayectoria for her body of work in 2006. Urriola published her first book of poetry, Piedras rodantes (Rolling Stones; Cuarto Propio) in 1988. Her poems appeared in many anthologies and were translated into English, German, French, and Italian. In addition to her poetry, she wrote scripts for cinema and television and participated in several public multimedia art projects, including La luz que me ciega (The Light that Blinds Me), featured at the 2015 Venice Biennale.
About ELENA BARCIA
Elena Barcia is a film and literary translator born and raised in Los Angeles. During her career in the film industry, she translated hundreds of movies from Hamlet to Harry Potter, and collaborated with directors like Martin Scorsese, Guillermo del Toro, Alfonso Cuarón, and Alejandro Iñárritu on the subtitle translations of their films. Her translation of Miguel de Unamuno’s classic novel Niebla (Fog) was published by Northwestern University Press in 2017. Her poetry translations have appeared in The Harvard Review, Asymptote, Dark Matter: Women Witnessing, Poetry International, and Exchanges, a Journal of Literary Translation. In both 2020 and 2022 she was a shortlisted for Poetry International’s Summer Chapbook competition, and her translation of Chilean poet Malú Urriola’s Cadáver exquisito was published in a bilingual edition by Valparaíso Editions USA in June of 2023. Her anthology of Chilean poet Rosabetty Muñoz’s poems titled Nothing Like Paradise will be published by Northwestern University Press in 2026.
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Genre: Poetry Translation
ISBN: 978-1-963115-41-3
Publication Date: July 15, 2025
