With the slogan "A flower opened the asphalt" and a fully urban vocation, Cosmopoetics takes over Córdoba again between September 26 and October 4 with a kick-off that focuses on the shared word and the shores from which it is written. The inaugural event will bring together Junot Diaz y Mayra Santos-Febres in conversation, and underlines the commitment to a program that combines poetry, music and thought.
The first day will also have a very marked stage seal with the absolute premiere of We are lionesses: the female rappers of Al-Andalus, a montage that combines Andalusian verses and contemporary sounds. From this starting point, the festival aims to be a open and plural meeting that spreads poetry through theaters, libraries and educational spaces in the city.
Opening, motto and protagonists
The opening ceremony is scheduled for Gongora Theatre at 20:30 p.m., with a dialogue between Díaz and Santos-Febres led by literary director Azahara Palomeque. Both authors will address how literature illuminates migrant and Afro-descendant realities, in tune with the verse of Carlos Drummond de Andrade that guides this edition.
The organization speaks of a poetic resilience which seeks to combat the noise of the present not through evasion, but through listening and caring. Along these lines, the Councilor for Culture, Isabel Albas, underlines the international ambition of the meeting without losing sight of the Cordoba and Andalusian perspective.
In the meeting with the media, Díaz left a self-critical reflection on the reading habit in a hyperconnected environment, while Santos-Febres claimed that poetry remains critical thinking engine and memory. Their distinct but complementary positions draw a common map: creating language to view reality from the margins.
The closing of the opening ceremony will be the premiere of Unas leonas somos, a literary and musical invocation signed by Manuel Antonio and the artist Andrea SantalusíaThe proposal recovers the voices of Andalusian poets such as al-Rakuniya, itimad, Aixa o Wallada, and places them in dialogue with current languages, from rap to electronics, to repair forgetfulness history.
For nine days, they will pass through the city near fifty authors national and international, confirming the weight of the festival, which already obtained the National Award for the Promotion of Reading in 2009. The event maintains its interdisciplinary nature and its vocation as a citizen meeting.
Programming and workshops: rap, flamenco and young audiences
Among the training activities, a intensive rap lyrics workshop taught by the Sevillian Haze, aimed at young people aged 14 to 25. It will be held on Saturday 27 and Sunday 28 September at the Youth House and requires prior registration through the festival website; participation is Delivery to Italy takes one or two business days.
Haze, known as "the flamenco rapper," went from the underground to becoming a benchmark in urban music in the 2000s; his album Chronicles of the Neighborhood It was recognized as best hip hop work in 2004. At Cosmopoética he will share with attendees the creative process of writing lyrics.
The training program is completed with a flamenco lyrics workshop imparted by David Eloy Rodriguez at the Fosforito Flamenco Center, from Tuesday, September 30 to Thursday, October 2, open to the public aged 18 and over, with online registration.
The cycle Cosmopeque will bring proposals for children: a writing workshop with Beatriz Oses (Saturday 27, Central Library "Antonio Gala") to introduce children to read and write, a family illustration activity with Adolf Serra that same afternoon, and the workshop Cultivating words to Mr. Vertigo On the 28th, which turns rhymes and games into a gateway to poetry.
Access to activities with controlled capacity will be through free admission with invitation, available from September 23 at the box office of the Great theater or online; each person will be able to withdraw two invitations.
Direction, changes and public debate
The Cordoban writer Azahara Palomeque (Castro del Río, 1986) takes on the literary direction of the festival for the first time and becomes the first woman in that position since 2004. After thirteen years in the United States and teaching and research experience, he returns with the idea of integrate the festival into the city with pedagogical actions, neighborhood participation and an interdisciplinary horizon.
Palomeque emphasizes that Cosmopoética should be present in classrooms, streets, and libraries, avoiding any elitist bias and fostering dialogue between generations. His commitment is to a cross-cutting programming where recitals, discussions and creative processes coexist, and to sustain the activity beyond the days of the festival.
In the preparation of this edition, names of great projection were considered, but due to schedules, they could not finally fit in - among them Anne carson o Antonio Munoz Molina—although avenues are open for future invitations. The literary conversation, in any case, overflows genres and looks for the mixture of glances.
In the previews of Cosmopoética, Díaz and Santos-Febres addressed issues such as migration, humanism and the place of culture. The Puerto Rican author defended weaving "impossible alliances" in the face of intolerance, observed a rise of young people who write after the pandemic and argued that literature can activate critical thinking and rescue silenced memories.
In terms of programming, there is a last-minute change: force majeure, Antonio Gamoneda will not travel to Córdoba. Instead, he will participate Miriam Reyes, recent winner of the National Poetry Award by With, who will dialogue with Alejandro López Andrada at Sala Orive. Reyes, a poet and translator trained in Ourense, Caracas and Barcelona, stands out for a work that explores bonds and corporality with remarkable linguistic power.
The start also comes with a political front: the spokesperson for Vox in the city Hall, Paula Badanelli, has reported alleged "irregularities" in the awarding of the festival. It maintains that the company awarded the contract promised the presence of four Nobel Prize winners and two Princess of Asturias Awards, but the official program only includes one winner of the latter and no Nobel PrizeThe municipal group has filed two documents to request the opening of sanctioning record, the retention of the guarantee and, if it were not possible to terminate the contract due to the immediacy of the event, cancel its extensions. The criticism also includes the weight of profiles that are not strictly poetic and the participation of Alfonso Guerra at the closing; at the time of going to press, there were no official responses to settle the matter.
Cosmopoética arrives with a diverse poster and a clear line: to open paths between poetry and other arts, to add training for all ages, to take care of peripheral voices and to facilitate access by invitation. Between the inauguration, workshops, agenda changes and public debate, the city has a long week to celebrate the word in all its forms.
