Spanish / Colombia
Adiós
(Good bye)
Obeso, Candelario
(text)
Mayorga, Juan Camilo
(illus.)
Dautant, Maité
(adapt.)
Bogotá: Cataplum libros, 2016. – [24] p.
ISBN 978-958-59619-0-6
Place of origin | Homesickness | Longing | Sea | Mountains | Poetry
Reading age: 5+
White Ravens issue: 2017
In recent years one has been able to find rare little treasures in Latin America, which widen the often narrow and unnecessarily constrained framing of children’s literature. In part, by “discovering” older texts of general audience literature and publishing these in editions for young readers, new facets in children’s literature are created. This picture book is an example of this, published by Cataplum libros, a small independent press that has recently entered the arena with a couple of very promising titles. “Adiós”, a poem by Black Colombian author Candelario Obeso (1849-1884), first appeared in Obeso’s collection “Cantos populares de mi tierra” (1877). Originally written in a local, rural Spanish dialect, it has been translated into modern-day Spanish for this edition. Illustrated with shining, atmospheric water colour pictures, it describes in verse the happy anticipation of a man who, having spent years away from his place of origin, is returning to his long-missed village by the sea.