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• Main Author: Michael P. Predmore
• Format: Article
• Language: Spanish
• Published: Universidad de Chile 2004-01-01
• Series: Revista Chilena de Literatura
• Online Access: https://revistaliteratura.uchile.cl/index.php/RCL/article/view/1574

This essay intends to study and identify a certain type of poetical sentiment and language of biblical origen and resonance deriving from the last book of the New Testament, the Apocalypse. In Neruda's "Residence" we find a world experience in a state of crisis, hostility and ruin; a powerful feeling of exile and alienation of the human being after the fall, and a desperate anguish to be living the last days on earth before the end of the world. It is also mentioned that this apocalyptic sense of "Residence" is reinforced and transformed into the vision of the "Canto General'. In this biblical and marxist epic which narrates the destiny of the Latin American peoples, there can be found a clear millenarian sense, Bible -inspired, that human history offers hope and redemption at the end of life's road. The Latin American world, buffeted by historical catastrophes (colonialism, slavery and imperialism) will find its resolution, its victory, in the fight and defense of the fallen. And thus the acute anguish of the Apocalypse (minus God and redemption) in the "Residence" is transformed into the "Canto General" by the strong revolutionary conviction that justice conquered through fighting by the oppressed people, is the supreme goal of this brutal stage in human history.