The Library of Congress Hispanic Literature Audio Archive Rebrands as the PALABRA Archive, 50 New Recordings Now Available to Stream Online

From LC’s 4 Corners of the World Blog:

With the Library’s Hispanic Heritage Month festivities underway, it is time to celebrate one of our institution’s most treasured Luso-Hispanic collections. This year, as is tradition during the heritage celebrations, the Hispanic Division of the Library of Congress announces the release of fifty new audio recordings from the Archive of Hispanic Literature on Tape (AHLOT) for online streaming. The release makes available new material from this literary audio archive of Iberian, Latin American, Caribbean, and LatinX poets and writers reading from their works.

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Effective this month, the Archive of Hispanic Literature on Tape (AHLOT) will become the PALABRA Archive. “Palabra” and the similar “palavra” mean “word” in Spanish and Portuguese respectively. Both have their origins in the Latin word “parabola” meaning story.

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New Resources

The first, the PALABRA Archive Research Guide, will function as the official comprehensive guide to the collection. This resource will refer you and other archive users to the recordings that are available for online streaming, as well as to the list of materials not yet available online, but accessible on our Capitol Hill campus. The PALABRA Archive Research Guide joins the growing list of Hispanic Studies and Literature guides, which are compiled by curators and librarians across the institution, and made available on the Library of Congress website.

The second feature is the StoryMap “Traveling Words and Sounds: The PALABRA Archive from the Hispanic Division,” an immersive audiovisual journey through some of the PALABRA Archive’s most treasured recordings. While navigating this page, you will experience some of the unique recordings from the archive, while enjoying photographs from the Library’s Prints and Photographs Division. The images depict some of the landscapes that have inspired so much of the poetry and literature represented in the collection. The website also includes a map that provides a geographical orientation of to the contents of the archive.

Fifty New Recordings Available for Online Streaming

Last but not least, as is our tradition during Hispanic Heritage Month, fifty new audio recordings from the PALABRA Archive are becoming available for online streaming. Among the newly available sessions are those of Guatemalan Nobel Laureate Miguel Ángel Asturias, Cuban poet and essayist Nancy Morejón, and prominent Chicano writer Rudolfo Anaya, who recently passed away (Anaya’s life and career was honored in a recent 4 Corners blogpost.

This year’s release will also include a series of recently recorded sessions of Maya Tsotsil and Maya Tseltal poets and writers from the Chiapas region in Mexico, an effort that was made possible thanks to a new partnership between the Library’s Hispanic Division and Dr. Inés Hernández-Ávila (Professor of Native American Studies, UC Davis), and Dr. Juan A. Ávila Hernández (independent scholar). This new collaboration aims to increase the diversity of the archive by recording more Indigenous literature and highlighting communities which have historically been under-represented in the Luso-Hispanic literary canon.

Links to Newly Added Audio Recordings Available Stream Online

Here are the fifty new authors, listed by country:

Argentina

• Manguel, Alberto, 2017 /Prose
• Nalé Roxlo, Conrado, 1958/ Poetry and Prose

Brazil

• Jaffe, Naomi, 2017 /Prose
• Santiago, Silviano, 1988 /Prose

Chile

• Lihn, Enrique, 1978 /Poetry

Colombia

• Hernández, Consuelo, 2016 /Poetry
• Restrepo, Félix, 1961 /Prose
• Romero, Armando, 1983 /Poetry and Prose

Costa Rica

• Naranjo, Carmen, 1984 /Poetry and Prose

Cuba

• Cabrera, Lydia, 1982 /Prose and Interviews
• Casal, Lourdes, 1980 /Poetry and Interviews
• Morejón, Nancy, 1979 /Poetry

Dominican Republic

• Incháustegui Cabral, Héctor, 1975 /Poetry

Ecuador

• Carrión, Alejandro, 1961 /Prose and Poetry
• Díaz Ycaza, Rafael, 1977 /Prose and Poetry
• Zambrano, Miguel Angel, 1961 /Poetry

Guatemala

• Asturias, Miguel Angel, 1958 /Poetry
• Monteforte Toledo, Mario, 1960 /Prose
• Rodríguez Macal, Virgilio, 1960 /Prose

Haiti

• Brierre, Jean F, 1952 /Poetry

Mexico

• Alvarez Pérez, Juan, 2019 /Poetry
• Bautista Vásquez, Maria Concepción, 2019 /Poetry
• Bolom Pale, Manuel, 2019 /Poetry
• Cosío Villegas, Daniel,1960 /Prose
• Gómez Pérez, Alberto, 2019 /Prose
• Huet Bautista, Nicolas, 2019 /Prose
• Jimenez Pérez, Maria Roselía, 2019 /Prose
• Juárez Espinosa, Isabel, 2019 /Theater
• López Sántiz, Adriana, 2019 /Poetry
• López Díaz, Andrés, 2019 /Poetry
• Martínez, Edgar Federico, 2019 /Poetry
• Pérez Martínez, Cristina, 2019 /Poetry
• Ruíz, Mikel, 2019 / Prose
• Seligson, Esther, 1981 /Prose and Poetry

Nicaragua

• Morales, Beltrán, 1983 /Poetry

Panama

• Jurado, Ramón H, 1960 /Prose
• Obaldía, María Olimpia de, 1960 /Poetry

Peru

• Bustamante y Rivero, José Luis, 1958 /Prose and Poetry
• Nieto, Luis, 1958 /Poetry

Portugal

• Correia, Natália, 1978 /Poetry
• Rebello, Luiz Francisco, 1994 /Interviews and Prose

Puerto Rico

• Benítez, Jaime, 1976 /Prose
• Santos Silva, Loreina, 1982 /Poetry

Spain

• Alberti, Rafael, 1958 /Poetry
• Bartra, Agustí, 1951 /Poetry

Suriname

• Lutchman, Martinus Haridat (Shrinivasi), c1980 /Poetry

USA

• Ambroggio, Luis Alberto, 2001 /Poetry
• Anaya, Rudolfo, 1985 /Prose and Interviews
• Manzano, Sonia, 2013 /Prose
• Martínez, Dionisio, 1999 /Poetry

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