{"id":8183,"date":"2017-03-17T23:00:52","date_gmt":"2017-03-18T03:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/?p=8183"},"modified":"2017-03-31T10:58:54","modified_gmt":"2017-03-31T14:58:54","slug":"nobel-laureate-playwright-and-poet-derek-walcott-dies-today-aged-87","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/nobel-laureate-playwright-and-poet-derek-walcott-dies-today-aged-87","title":{"rendered":"Nobel laureate, playwright, and poet Derek Walcott dies today aged 87"},"content":{"rendered":"
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17 March 2017<\/em><\/p>\n

It is with great sadness that PEN International received the news of Nobel laureate, playwright, & poet Derek Walcott\u2019s death earlier today. Statements from PEN President Jennifer Clement and Executive Director Carles Torner are below.<\/p>\n

\u2018It is a moment for sadness and pause when you hear of the death of a writer whose work has had such a deep impact on contemporary literature.<\/em> Over the years, Derek Walcott joined several PEN International statements and petitions, and read at one of our earliest <\/em>FreeTheWord events. We will always be honoured to have had him as part of our community, and to have been touched by his great skill, his commanding voice, and his kinship. Our thoughts go out to his family and friends at this time, and within our membership we will read, remember, and celebrate his life and work.\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n

\u2013 Jennifer Clement, President, PEN International<\/p>\n

\u2018Derek Walcott trained as a painter. I am always reminded of this when I return to his poetry: lush and lyrical, his pen is as a brush, creating strokes that flow image to image, carrying us on the breath of it. He was without doubt a master craftsman, a poet who fused sound and image seamlessly. Who else would talk of the \u2018ceaseless creasing of the morning sea\u2019 and \u2018the moon\u2019s blank tambourine\/and the drizzle\u2019s guitars\u2019 (from \u2018[the day with all its pain ahead is yours]\u2019)? Somehow the world \u2013 in all its sensory variation \u2013 is both pinned down and moving, and in its transience it carries us along too.<\/em><\/p>\n

That said, Walcott\u2019s writing does not allow for passivity. Walcott calls us in and spits us out, often juxtaposing \u2018I\u2019, \u2018you\u2019 and \u2018we\u2019 in ways that force the reader to be part of the work too. Through it, we question identity, emotion, and history, called into awareness of the Caribbean heritage he writes from and the resonance of Caribbean landscape: its sounds and its music in particular.\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n

\u2013 Carles Torner, Executive Director, PEN International<\/p>\n

Source\uff1ahttp:\/\/www.pen-international.org\/newsitems\/nobel-laureate-playwright-and-poet-derek-walcott-dies-today-aged-87\/<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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