This poetic line suggests that memories are like a lost homeland, reachable only in our minds and sleep. It highlights how the past is a powerful, yet distant, realm we constantly revisit mentally, often longing for what is lost or unreachable.
Quote by Marjorie Agosín: “Memory is an exiled country, a place we return to in dreams.”
Memory is an exiled country, a place we return to in dreams.
Insight
Historical Context
Published two decades after the Pinochet coup in Chile, Agosín's memoir reflected on the trauma of dictatorship and exile, emphasizing how memory becomes a vital, yet painful, refuge for those who have lost their physical home.
About the Author
Chilean-American poet, human rights activist, and professor whose work bears witness to the disappeared under Pinochet's Chile and to the lived experience of Jewish Latin American women. She has received the United Nations Leadership Award for Human Rights and the Gabriela Mistral Medal of Honor.
View all quotes by Marjorie Agosín