“Pablo Neruda is one of the world’s most widely loved poets whose reputation has spread ever wider since his death in 1973, inspiring books, films, and song cycles. Now he has inspired actor David Soul to create a one-man show based on readings of his poems with live musical accompaniment from guitarist Hugh Burns. We listen in to Soul’s show, The Passion and Poetry of Pablo Neruda, staged in London for one night only by Spoken Word producers WordTheatre. We also talk to Soul with Neruda’s biographer Adam Feinstein about the life, loves, and political passions of the Chilean Nobel literature laureate.”
—The Guardian

“You can say anything you want, but it’s the words that sing. They soar and they descend… I bow to them, I cling to them, I run them down, I bite into them, I melt them down… I catch them in mid-flight as they buzz past. I trap them, I clean them, I peel them… I want to fit them all into my poems. They have a crystalline texture… vibrant, ivory, vegetable, oily, like fruit, like algae, like agates, like olives. And then I stir them, I shake them, I drink them, I gulp them down, I mash them, I garnish them … I let them go.” —Pablo Neruda from his autobiography, MEMOIRS