Author Description

Well-established as a poet, essayist and novelist, the writer Luis Benítez needs little introduction. His books have been published in Argentina, Mexico, Chile, Uruguay, the United States and Venezuela. He was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Among other things, he is a member of the Latin-American Academy of Poetry, the International Society of Writers, and the Argentinian Foundation for Poetry. His work has brought him international recognition and he has been the recipient of many prestigious awards including the La Porte des Poétes International Award (Paris, 1991), the International Award of Fiction (Uruguay, 1996), the Primo Premio Tusculorum di Poesia (Italy, 1996) and the International Award for Published Work "Macedonio Palomino", (Mexico, 2008). Over the years, many of his poems have appeared in the small press magazines and journals in the USA and the UK but this is the first time that a substantial body of his work has been translated into English and presented as a full-length collection in its own right. The editorial team at Ravenna Press are to be congratulated on making a selection of his work available to the English-speaking world. This can only serve to enhance the poet's reputation by bringing his work to a wider audience. As with all great writers, his themes are universal. The way in which he chooses to convey these themes is masterful. Each poem has a conciseness about it, an ease which can be deceptive at first reading, because it belies the weight of the subject matter that lies beneath the surface. There is no florid language, no superficial excess; Benitez cuts to the chase and makes his statements with the minimum of fuss. "This Morning I Wrote Two Poems" is a good example. The almost conversational title might bring to mind William Carlos Williams (I am thinking of his poem "This is Just to Say…"). The conversational tone continues throughout the poem because the words fall easily down the page. It is, of course, a work that concerns