In Paris, Neruda embarked on a number of activist publishing ventures in support of the Republican cause. He collaborated with Nancy Cunard, an activist who “embodied the dazzling energy and tumultuous spirit of her age.” Neruda first met Cunard in Madrid, where she reported on the war for the Manchester Guardian and the Associated Negro Press. Now together in Paris, they published a solidarity magazine named Les poètes du monde défendent le peuple espagnol (Poets of the World Defend the Spanish People). Cunard had a printing press in her house; Neruda helped set the type. The money from the sale of the magazine went to support the Republican soldiers battling Franco’s troops. The funds raised were not significant, but just as with Mono azul, the dedicated, unabashed support from important contributors spoke volumes. Their involvement was a public pledge that boosted the morale of all those defending the Republic and helped raise international awareness and sympathy for the cause. Then on January 30, 1937, Neruda, Delia, César Vallejo, Alejo Carpentier, the Mexican muralist David Alfaro Siqueiros, and others formed the Ibero-American Committee for the Defense of the Spanish Republic. It was a strong showing of unity. Neruda became one of the editors of its weekly bulletin, Nuestra España (Our Spain).
In February, the first issue of Neruda and Cunard’s magazine appeared in Spanish, containing one poem from each of them (Cunard’s translated into Spanish by Vicente Aleixandre), as well as verse by Miguel Hernández. On the title page they announced: “Madrid will be the tomb of International Fascism—Writers: combat the assassins of Federico García Lorca in your country. We ask for money, food, clothes and arms for the Spanish Republic. ¡No pasarán! They will not pass!”
The subsequent six issues had pieces by an array of international writers, including a previously unpublished piece by Lorca. Efforts such as these inspired solidarity efforts from writers across the globe.
Despite Maquieira’s disapproval, on February 20, 1937, Neruda gave his Lorca lecture to fellow sympathizers of the Spanish Republic. Neruda first spoke at length about Lorca, and then about poets like Alberti and Hernández currently fighting in Spain. He ended the lecture:
I have wanted to bring before you the remembrance of our great disappeared comrade. Many perhaps hoped for some tranquil poetic words from me, distanced from the earth and the war. The word “Spain” itself brings to many people an immense anguish mixed with a grave hope. I have not wanted to augment these anguishes nor disturb our hopes, but having just left Spain, I, Latin American, Spanish of race and language, could not have been able to speak except for its disgraces. I am not political, nor have I ever taken part in political arguments, and my words, which many would have liked to be neutral, have been dyed with passion. Understand me and understand that we, the poets of Spanish America and the poets of Spain, we will never forget or pardon the assassin of whom we consider to be the greatest among us, the angel of this moment of our language. And forgive me that of all the sorrows of Spain you only remember the life and death of a poet. We will never be able to forgive this crime or pardon it. We will never forget or pardon it. Never.
In Nuestra España, Neruda had published a letter “To my American friends”:
Every day I receive solicitudes and friendly letters that say to me: put your attitude aside, don’t speak of Spain, don’t contribute to the exasperation of people’s spirits, don’t you embark on favoritism, you have the high mission of being a poet to achieve, etc. . . . I want to respond once and for all that I have situated myself in the civil war on the side of the Spanish people with the consciousness that the future of the spirit and culture of our race directly depends on the result of this fight . . .
The next day, Neruda received a letter from Tulio Maquieira saying that he had received official word from Santiago that the minister of foreign affairs “disapproved” of Neruda’s partisan political activities. That same month, the second edition of Les poètes du monde défendent le peuple espagnol came out, this time in French, with a poem by Vicente Aleixandre and Tristan Tzara, as well as French translations of Neruda’s, Hernández’s, and Cunard’s poems from the previous issue. April’s edition had poems by Lorca and Langston Hughes. W. H. Auden had intended to serve in the International Brigades out of a sense of obligation: “Here is something I can do as a citizen and not as a writer.” Upon his return to London, he sent “Spain 1937” to Cunard and Neruda.
Neruda and Delia joined the efforts to prepare a Second International Congress of Writers for the Defense of Culture, which was to be held in Spain. Neruda worked to get Latin American writers to attend. While he received a small salary for this, he was not fully supporting Maruca, who was still in Monte Carlo, unable to make a living. Forlorn, Maruca took her daughter to Holland. Being from Batavia, a Dutch colony, facilitated her and Malva Marina’s immigration, and she had some relatives in The Hague. It was obvious at this point that the marriage would not last much longer. Neruda, it seems, may have made one trip to visit them. No matter what, his position was that the uncertainty of what awaited him in Chile and of where his new consular post could be just presented too much instability, especially given Malva Marina’s condition; she and Maruca should stay in Holland. At this point it also was clear that Malva’s illness was incurable.
Meanwhile, by April 1937, Franco and his generals had become
