With an unpublished collection of poems, 100 years of the birth of Jaime Sabines will be celebrated

Jaime Sabines (Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chipas, 1926-1999) told his children, on the last day of his life, that “love is the most important thing in the world.” On March 25, it will be a century since the birth of the “love poet,” considered one of the most important exponents of verse of the 20th century. To commemorate it, tributes will be made with plays, dance, a lottery ticket, a ceremony at the Palace of Fine Arts and in the Chamber of Deputies, and the presentation of an unpublished, yet unnamed collection of poems.

In interview with The Day, His daughter, Judith Sabines, added: “My dad would be happy to know that his readers will be able to learn a little more about his work, something that has never been seen before.

“He had several large notebooks with poems that he never published, because he wanted to review them thoroughly, but everything that will come to light was chosen by him.

“This new book is made up of 70 poems dating from between 1965 and 1968. We have a lot of unpublished material and we want it to come out before the birthday, March 25, but we do not have a clear date.

“He was very demanding to write, so what he did not approve will not be published. We suffered because my father’s handwriting is very difficult to read, and he wrote in an accounting notebook while he was lying down, which made it difficult for us to transcribe it, but we are almost ready,” he said.

Jaime Sabines loved literature from a very young age. He was the youngest of his brothers, so he had the privilege of completing his studies. He entered the National Autonomous University of Mexico to study medicine, in order to please his parents, a misunderstanding that he later clarified with them, and he was able to change careers to literature, where he was friends with Rosario Castellanos, Dolores Castro, Roberto Cabral and Efrén Hernández.

In 1952 he returned to Tuxtla Gutiérrez and a year later he married. He was already a recognized poet for his book Mountaineer, published two years earlier. He worked as a clerk in a clothing store belonging to his family, and in his free time he wrote his poems in long accounting notebooks.

“I realized that I was a poet when I was in high school. I read Manuel Gutiérrez Nájera and Rubén Darío, and I said: ‘My father said this phrase.’ He had a privileged memory and loved to recite. As children he told us many verses that we didn’t know were verses. He learned complete volumes, he procured and bought us our first books,” commented the daughter of the author of Yuria.

She shared that “at family gatherings he was fascinated by reciting poetry. He had a very good voice and gave recitals at our high school. He talked to us about love and death. As an adult I told him that I didn’t understand why he was so focused on that. I found in his lyrics appreciation for life, and he told me: ‘of course, it’s the love of life that makes me think about death!'”

Jaime Sabines faced two great losses that transformed his lyrics. The first was his daily life in the capital, interrupted by his return to Chiapas in 1952, a period to which he dedicated the collection of poems. Trumpet (1956), a mirror of his frustration when considering that he could not further expand his literary horizons. The second loss was that of his father, Julio, to whom he dedicated Something about the death of Major Sabines (1962).

“Wrote Trumpet the year I was born. Reading it I realized that I was overwhelmed. He had already been offered a scholarship to study in France, but he rejected it to be with his family, and all his pretensions as a writer faded. “He wrote in the afternoons, lying down, fighting against everyday life and the boredom of family business,” said the poet’s daughter.

“His verses had no corrections. He reflected a lot before writing. It’s wonderful, because other authors are used to making scratches and modifications, that allows us to know that they change their minds. And my father didn’t, what he wrote like that stayed in his heart and in his mind, although it doesn’t mean that he didn’t regret some verses. If he didn’t like the poem, he crossed it out completely,” commented the interviewee.

In 1959, the family sold their businesses and moved to Mexico City. The poet Sabines focused even more on his children. “He took us to the park, to the fair, he played board games. It made us extraordinarily sensitive. Maybe even shy, because he always taught us to read and to be more focused on calm than on extroversion,” he explained.

After the death of his father, Jaime Sabines left the poem he dedicated to him incomplete and silenced his creativity. Years passed before he decided to face the duel. “When the collection of poems came out, in 1973, the criticism did not take long to fall: they reproached him for making ‘half-finished, failed sonnets’. In this regard, my father told me: ‘they don’t know that they are incomplete, because I myself am broken.’

On November 12, 1989, while visiting his sister-in-law in Chiapas, the poet tripped at the entrance to the home and fractured his left femur. Added to this was that he contracted an infection during his hospitalization in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, which further deteriorated his health. Despite multiple surgeries, the results were not positive and he had to rely on a wheelchair.

Sabines fell ill with cancer shortly after, which led to his subsequent confinement at home. That illness took him from this plane on March 19, 1999. He was buried in the Jardín pantheon; His remains lie next to his parents, Julio and Luz. “We remember him with great affection, his children and his readers, but above all the young lovers. His search was always directed towards them, towards love, life and ways of feeling. For him, poetry was a bridge between souls.”

In Mexico City, the Chamber of Deputies will pay tribute in honor of Jaime Sabines on March 26 at 6:30 p.m., in the Legislators room. Another ceremony and a conversation will be dedicated to him in the Manuel M. Ponce room of the Palace of Fine Arts, on Sunday the 29th at 12 noon. The National Autonomous University of Mexico will publish two new editions of Volcano Chronicles and Reading Material. Poetry.

Activities in Chiapas and a Lotenal ticket

His home state could not ignore the anniversary: ​​this 2026 was named by the local congress as the Year of Jaime Sabines; The cultural center that bears his name in Tuxtla Gutiérrez will also be remodeled, where book presentations, readings aloud, conferences, documentaries and interviews about the writer will be held.

Likewise, an exhibition of photographs and paintings called One hundred years of Jaime Sabines in the contemporary art gallery of that facility, said Angélica Althuzar, director of the State Council for Culture and the Arts of Chiapas (Coneculta).

“We have already approved the issuance of a National Lottery (Lotenal) ticket in which his figure will appear, although the publication date is missing.

“We are also working, together with the state Secretary of Education, on a special edition of his works, which we will distribute for free in schools and cultural centers, in addition to another free edition with photographs and a poetic selection.

“He was a simple man who used everyday language and transformed it into poetic, he was a regular at reading his work in public, in large venues, which were packed to listen to him. There is that occasion in which he filled the Palace of Fine Arts, where they even chanted his name. We want his voice to be heard again throughout the country,” commented the official. The complete program of activities will be available at the end of February on Coneculta’s social networks.