PICASSO, Pablo. Hunk of Skin. San Francisco: City Lights Books. 1968.
Small 4to. Red and yellow card wrappers; pp. 40, bilingual text; fine.
First edition, featuring Pablo Picasso’s poetry in the original Spanish alongside the English translation by Paul Blackburn.
Hunk of Skin (Trozo de Piel) was the first Picasso poem written in Spanish to be publised in English and this first US edition features an introductory note by the Spanish writer and Novel laureate in literature Camilo Jose Cela Y Trulock (1916-2002).
Penned in Cannes on 8 and 9 January 1959, the poem reflects Picasso’s dreams of his childhood in Malaga, evoking memories of his birthplace.
Paul Blackburn (1926-1971) was a prominent American poet and translator, particularly noted for his translations from Spanish. In addition to translating Picasso’s work, he gained recognition for his versions of the medieval epic Cantar de Mio Cid, the poetry of Federico García Lorca and the short stories of Julio Cortázar, whom he thanks in the foreword of this issue for "correcting and corroborating the following versions".
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