Cuba remembered the centennial of poet Jesús Orta Ruiz

One hundred years since the birth of Cuban poet and decimist Jesús Orta Ruiz, better known as El Indio Naborí, is remembered today in the Caribbean island, to which he dedicated his work.

‘… I am a man without a shadow,’ wrote the also narrator and journalist, a poem highlighted this Friday by the Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba (Uneac), organization of which he was a founder and member of its National Council.

On its Twitter account, Uneac remembered his centennial and described the 1995 National Prize for Literature as a guiding beacon for generations of poets.

The birthday of the Naborí Indian was revered these days on the Caribbean island with a varied program of activities including the presentation of a documentary, a book and a CD on his life and work.

As part of the commemoration, a panel dedicated to the political poetry of the also decimist and singer took place at the Fidel Castro Center in Havana.

In the tribute, Alba and Fidel Orta, his children, recalled the trajectory of the Naborí Indian, who dedicated a large part of his work to extolling the values ​​of the Revolution and its maximum leader.

The author of ‘The Return of the Fifth Wizard. Naborí: life and poetry’, a book of memoirs about his father, took a tour of the life of the Cuban intellectual (1922-2005), who lived a hard childhood, suffered eviction and then lost his home due to a hurricane .

He mentioned how he faced many obstacles to study, but still he drank from literature in a self-taught way until he became one of the most recognized Cuban decimists and improvisers, deeply rooted among the rural and urban population of the Antillean nation.

He pointed out that there is nothing more similar to him than his own poetry, which is why he never wanted to write his memoirs, so whoever wants to really know him should only approach his work, both written and oral.

The narrator Fidel Orta highlighted the imprint of the revolutionary struggles and the magnetism emanating from the thought of Fidel Castro, since he met him in 1952, in the poetic work of the Naborí Indian, which made him devote himself completely to service from 1959 to 1972. of the social process undertaken in Cuba, although long before he accompanied it with his verse.

He stressed there was no transcendental event on the Caribbean island during its years of creation that would not feature the poetic rhyme of the writer, “a poet of emotions, emotions that sought the theme,” according to the director of the Office of Cultural Research and Promotion Nabori Indian.

For the son, another student of his father’s work, beyond his extensive poetic work, Jesús Orta renewed the sung and written tenth, invigorated the elegy, granted an unusual range of perpetuity to the social lyric, his energized the verse free, among other contributions.

As part of the celebration, this week the First Ibero-American Congress of the Tenth and Improvised Verse was scheduled to take place under the motto Come with your tenth of mine, which was postponed due to the damage caused to the island by Hurricane Ian.