Notes from the Boiler Room

     Welcome to the second voyage of Terra Incognita. On behalf of the crew in New York and Madrid, I'd like to thank all of you, our readers, for the generous praise we received on the premiere issue. We've been moved by the wonderful response to the project and feel inspired to work even harder to provide an open space for the new ideas and creative work coming out of the many English and Spanish-speaking communities on both sides of the Atlantic.

     We're excited about the voices gathered here in #2 and hope your journey through these pages will be a rewarding one. American writer Billy Collins talks with Alexandra van de Kamp about his poetry (and the Beatniks, the Romantics, Emily Dickinson, his first experience with jazz, etc.), bringing to the conversation the same thoughtfulness, wisdom, and sly humor that he consistently brings to his work. In addition, we've translated both the interview and four of his poems to introduce him to our Spanish-speaking audience. There's also our usual selection of poetry from emerging writers in both English and Spanish, as well as four new pieces of fiction, including one by a Basque writer living in New York. For lovers of non-fiction, we offer articles on Argentinian writer Ernesto Sabato and Fernando de Roja's famous play La Celestina, as well as a new section entitled Voices/Vozes, in which the indigenous peasant farmer's group Via Campesina talks about the current situation for agricultural workers in the face of neoliberal globalization. We also bring you a range of visual work from different parts of the world, including the portfolio of a young Spanish artist named Fran.

     Finally, Terra Incognita presents a special dossier in this issue on Neoliberal Chile. In 1999, former dictator Augusto Pinochet was detained in London by order of a Spanish judge on charges of torture, kidnapping and other crimes against humanity. The Pinochet Case not only marked a new chapter in the quest for human rights, it also revealed the murky and interrelated nature of the global political and economic order, involving, as it did, the governments of Chile, Spain, England, and the United States. Robert Lavigna takes a look at the historical background of the case, some of the face-saving legal maneuvers that went on behind the scenes, and the disturbing role of the U.S. Government and U.S. corporations in bringing Pinochet to power in 1973. He also reveals how the neoliberal economic theory -- better known as "globalization" - was implemented for the first time during Pinochet's brutal regime, a fact that politicians and the media never bother to mention. The dossier also includes fiction by Janet Ruhe-Schoen, an American writer who lived in Chile during the dictatorship, and the testimony of a young Chilean woman whose brother was kidnapped, tortured, and murdered at the hands of Pinochet's agents.

     Again, we appreciate everyone's enthusiasm about the project. I'd like to extend heartfelt thanks to our dedicated translators, volunteers, and financial supporters for making Terra Incognita a reality. May all of us continue to explore the "unknown territory" in ourselves, our communities and in the cultures around us, so that we become broader and deeper human beings. It's an interesting time in the world - both exciting and threatening. No matter what our creative projects, whether they be artistic, political, spiritual, environmental, whether they have to do with our families, our schools, our neighborhoods, our countries, or our dear planet herself, may all of us go forth to work on them with a bit of wisdom, a bit of patience, a bit of hope, with our wits about us, unafraid, without cynicism, open to new possibilities, reading closely the stars above and the waters below, and learning how to follow that ancient and mysterious element we call the wind.