Ronald Kay published this collection of works by Nicanor Parra in News from Nowhere, in the only issue of Manuscritos magazine (Santiago: Departamento de Estudios Humanísticos, Universidad de Chile, 1975). Kay underscores the value of these poetic-visual works that are nothing like the poetry for which Parra was known and which exploded on the local literary scene like “out of control news.” News from Nowhere consisted of an assortment of throw-away works, sketches, and texts (or simply “junk” as Parra called them). They had not been included in any books, and were discarded because they did not fit into any specific editorial vision. They were basically corrected texts, diagrams, illustrations, anti-poems, verses, and stories. They included “El reloj de Venancio;” “La ceremonia de don Zacarías;” “Improvisaciones más o menos premeditadas;” “El mar;” “Díadas;” “Misión cumplida;” “La columna transparente;” “Found Poem;” “La vuelta del viajero;” “La mujer equis;” “Memorias de un ataúd;” and “Filosofía natural.”

The material that the Chilean poet Ronald Kay (1941–2017) published in News from Nowhere formed the basis for the work later produced by the writer Nicanor Parra (1914–2018) in terms of both his visual poetry and the objects he used to explore and refer to Stéphane Mallarmé’s ideas about an “absolute book.” In the words of the French poet, “tout, au monde, existe pour aboutir à un livre” [everything in the world exists to become a book].

Parra’s collection also expanded the boundaries of Chilean poetry and launched the field of visual poetry in Chile. The following writers were part of the visual poetry tradition in Chile: Ludwig Zeller (b. 1927), Guillermo Deisler (1940–95), Tito Valenzuela (b. 1945), and Cecilia Vicuña (b. 1948). The group later included Juan Luis Martínez (1942–93) and Raúl Zurita (b. 1950).

News from Nowhere reveals the dual archeology involved in the project, as seen from the geological strata of its creation: in the first place, the exhibited materials that are part of a vast re-writing effort; and in the second, the notebooks in which Parra made notes for his various projects. Kay—who selected and arranged Parra’s writings—reveals the learned spaces and rewards contained in the various boxes; he also writes an essay about the spatial arrangement of the visual topography.

[For information about Nicanor Parra, see the following texts in the ICAA digital archive: “Los trabajos prácticos de Nicanor Parra” (doc. no. 753780) by Justo Pastor Mellado; and by Nicanor Parra “Artefactos” (doc. no. 753705), and “Chistes parra (para) desorientar a la policía (poesía)” (doc. no. 753714)].