A Poet of the Ethics of the Real

This chapter explores Vallejo as a poet of the “ethics of the Real” due to the way his poetry represents excess and lack as central dynamics of the human condition. Assuming the Lacanian category of the Real as what is beyond the rules established by culture, the chapter addresses Vallejo’s poetry as one that has chosen to think subjectivity from its failures. It interprets some of Vallejo’s central poems in order to observe how this leads to unexpected political possibilities.