Two Latin American Women Poets Writing in Ladino: Denise León and Myriam Moscona

In this paper I will discuss the new books by Argentine Denise León and Mexican Myriam Moscona. In León’s 2008 Poemas de Estambul the poet revisits childhood memories, and depicts visual fragments of her past, when her grandparents spoke to her in Ladino. The Judeo-Spanish language gradually converts into a language of memory, nostalgia, and family origins, Her 2011 Saco de Douglas, written in Castellano and Ladino, presents the Ladino of her home, fruit of linguistic crossings and encounters, and of the challenges of being surrounded by Castellano.

Moscona recently published three books revolving around Ladino: one, a “novel,” mixing genres and techniques, and speaking of exile, language, dreams, the search for one’s roots, and the destruction of Ladino. The second book, a compilation of texts in Ladino co-organized with Jacobo Sefamí. The third book, Ansina, is a poetry volume in Ladino, which also includes words from contemporary Spanish. Its poems dialogue with names such as Paul Celan, Edmond Jabès, Marcel Cohen, and texts from both the Zohar (Kabbalah) and the Talmud.

The work of these two poets allows us to observe the shaping of a Latin American Sephardic identity; to interrogate the place of Ladino in Spanish American poetry and concurrently identify relationships between Ladino literature and literature in other languages; to acknowledge the power of minor languages to mine and redefine major languages; and to trace the connections established between language, memory, and identity.