The plumed horn / El corno emplumado: poetry, translation and subversion

Abstract

In this essay, the importance of translation as a means of subversion is studied through the bilingual literary magazine El Corno emplumado / The plumed horn. It was published in Mexico City in 1962 and ran for seven and a half years, until 1969. The editors and poets, Sergio Mondragón and Margaret Randall, founded, wrote, translated, and edited 31 volumes in total. It was a bilingual trimester publication —spanish/english—, of art and literature. Some of the many objectives that the editors had were to create a cultural exchange between the Spanish speaking countries and the English ones; to spread the pacifist ideas of the time, which came from a marked social conscience; and to translate other not yet translated poets from the continent in order to inform readers of the realities that oppressed nations by dictatorial governments, where going through. It is the case of “America” by beat poet Allen Ginsberg and “México: XIXth Olympiad” by the Nobel prize winner Octavio Paz, also analyzed in the text.