Poetry
Muriel Rukeyser held a visionary belief in the human capacity to create social change through language. She earned an international reputation as a powerful voice against enforced silences of all kind, against the violence of war, poverty, and racism. Her eloquent poetry of witness-of the Scottsboro Nine, the Spanish Civil War, the poisoning of the Gauley Bridge laborers-split the darkness covering a shameful world.
In addition to the complete texts of her twelve previously published books, this volume also features new poems discovered by the editors; Rukeyser's translations, including the first English translations of Octavio Paz's work; early work by Rukeyser not previously published in book form; and the controversial book-length poem Wake Island. An introduction by the editors traces Rukeyser's life and literary reputation and complements discerning annotations and textual notes to the poems.
From the astonishing debut "Hawk in the Rain" (1957) to "Birthday Letters" (1998), Ted Hughes was one of postwar literature's truly prodigious poets. This remarkable volume gathers all of his work, from his earliest poems (published only in journals) through the ground-breaking volumes "Crow" (1970), "Gaudete"(1977), and "Tales from Ovid" (1997). It includes poems Hughes composed for fine-press printers, poems he wrote as England's Poet Laureate, and those children's poems that he meant for adults as well. This omnium-gatherum of Hughes's work is animated throughout by a voice that, as Seamus Heaney remarked, was simply "longer and deeper and rougher" than those of his contemporaries.
There is no more authoritative collection of the poetry that Eliot himself wished to preserve than this volume, published two years before his death in 1965.
Poet, dramatist, critic, and editor, T. S. Eliot was one of the defining figures of twentieth-century poetry. This edition of Collected Poems 1909-1962 includes The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock along with Four Quartets, The Waste Land, and several other poems.
This outstanding new translation brings a uniformity of voice to Zbigniew Herbert's entire poetic output, from his first book of poems, String of Light, in 1956, to his final volume, previously unpublished in English, Epilogue Of the Storm. Collected Poems: 1956-1998, as Joseph Brodsky said of Herbert's SSelected Poems, is bound for a much longer haul than any of us can anticipate. He continues, For Zbigniew Herbert's poetry adds to the biography of civilization the sensibility of a man not defeated by the century that has been most thorough, most effective in dehumanization of the species. Herbert's irony, his austere reserve and his compassion, the lucidity of his lyricism, the intensity of his sentiment toward classical antiquity, are not just trappings of a modern poet, but the necessary armor--in his case well-tempered and shining indeed--for man not to be crushed by the onslaught of reality. By offering to his readers neither aesthetic nor ethical discount, this poet, in fact, saves them frorn that poverty which every form of human evil finds so congenial. As long as the species exists, this book will be timely.
The poems of the legendary Nobel Laureate, in one volume at last
One of the greatest and grandest advocates of the literary vocation, Joseph Brodsky truly lived his life as a poet, and for it earned eighteen months in an Arctic labor camp, expulsion from his native country, and the Nobel Prize in Literature. Such were one man's wages. Here, collected for the first time, are all the poems he published in English, from his earliest collaborations with Derek Walcott, Richard Wilbur, Howard Moss, and Anthony Hecht to the moving farewell poems he wrote near the end of his life. With nearly two hundred poems, several of them never before published in book form, this will be the essential volume of Brodsky's work.
Since its initial publication in 1953, this book has become the definitive edition of the poet's work. Thomas wrote "Prologue" addressed to "my readers, the strangers" -- an introduction in verse that was the last poem he would ever write. Also included are classics such as "And Death Shall Have No Dominion," "Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night," and "Fern Hill" that have influenced generations of artists from Bob Dylan (who changed his last name from Zimmerman in honor of the poet), to John Lennon (The Beatles included Thomas' portrait on the cover of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band); this collection even appears in the film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's The Road when it is retrieved from the rubble of a bookshelf.
And death shall have no dominion.
Dead men naked they shall be one
With the man in the wind and the west moon;
When their bones are picked clean and their clean bones gone,
They shall have stars at elbow and foot;
Though they go mad they shall be sane,
Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again,
Though lovers be lost love shall not:
And death shall have no dominion.
(From "And Death Shall Have No Dominion")
The complete poems of the two-time finalist for the Nobel Prize in Literature, available in English for the first time
This volume collects and translates--most for the first time--the nine volumes of poetry published by Édouard Glissant, a poet, novelist, and critic increasingly recognized as one of the great writers of the twentieth century. The poems bring to life what Glissant calls "an archipelago-like reality," partaking of the exchanges between Europe and its former colonies, between humans and their geographies, between the poet and the natural world.Reciting and re-creating histories of the African diaspora, Columbus's "discovery" of the New World, the slave trade, and the West Indies, Glissant underscores the role of poetic language in changing both past and present irrevocably. As translator Jeff Humphries writes in his introduction, Glissant's poetry embraces the aesthetic creed of the French symbolists Mallarmé and Rimbaud ("The poet must make himself into a seer") and aims at nothing less than a hallucinatory experience of imagination in which the differences among poem, reader, and subject dissolve into one immediate present.
Born in Martinique in 1928, influenced by the controversial Martinican poet/politician Aimé Césaire, and educated at the Sorbonne in Paris, Édouard Glissant has emerged as one of the most influential postcolonial theorists, novelists, playwrights, and poets not only in the Caribbean but also in contemporary French letters. He has twice been a finalist for the Nobel Prize in Literature as well as the recipient of both the Prix Renaudot and the Prix Charles Veillon in France. His works include Poetics of Relation, Caribbean Discourse, Faulkner Mississippi, and the novel The Ripening. He currently serves as Distinguished Professor of French at City University of New York, Graduate Center.
Adrienne Rich was the singular voice of her generation and one of our most important American poets. She brought discussions of gender, race, and class to the forefront of poetical discourse, pushing formal boundaries and consistently examining both self and society.
This collected volume traces the evolution of her poetry, from her earliest work, which was formally exact and decorous, to her later work, which became increasingly radical in both its free-verse form and feminist and political content. The entire body of her poetry is on display in this vast volume, including the National Book Award-winning Diving Into the Wreck and her prize-winning Atlas of the Difficult World.
The Collected Poems of Adrienne Rich gathers and memorializes all of her boldly political, formally ambitious, thoughtful, and lucid work, the whole of which makes her one of the most prolific and influential poets of our time.
Rita Dove's Collected Poems 1974-2004 showcases the wide-ranging diversity that earned her a Pulitzer Prize, the position of U.S. poet laureate, a National Humanities Medal, and a National Medal of Art. Gathering thirty years and seven books, this volume compiles Dove's fresh reflections on adolescence in The Yellow House on the Corner and her irreverent musings in Museum. She sets the moving love story of Thomas and Beulah against the backdrop of war, industrialization, and the civil right struggles. The multifaceted gems of Grace Notes, the exquisite reinvention of Greek myth in the sonnets of Mother Love, the troubling rapids of recent history in On the Bus with Rosa Parks, and the homage to America's kaleidoscopic cultural heritage in American Smooth all celebrate Dove's mastery of narrative context with lyrical finesse. With the "precise, singing lines" for which the Washington Post praised her, Dove "has created fresh configurations of the traditional and the experimental" (Poetry magazine).
Regarded by many as the greatest of the metaphysical poets, John Donne was also among the most intriguing figures of the Elizabethan Age. A sensualist who composed erotic and playful love poetry in his youth, he was raised a Catholic but later became one of the most admired Protestant preachers of his time. Reflecting this wide diversity, Collected Poetry includes his youthful songs and sonnets, epigrams, elegies, letters, satires, and the profoundly moving Divine Poems composed toward the end of his life. From joyful works such as The Flea, which transforms the image of a louse into something marvelous, to the intimate and intense Holy Sonnets, Donne breathed new vigor into poetry by drawing startling metaphors from the world in which he lived. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
The complete early work of the renowned African-American poet.
"Nikki Giovanni is one of our national treasures."--Gloria Naylor
This omnibus includes her first seven volumes of poetry from her early years, 1967 to 1983: Black Feeling Black Talk; Black Judgement; Re: Creation; My House; The Women and the Men; Cotton Candy on a Rainy Day; and Those Who Ride the Night Winds. A timeless classic, it is both a reflection of the changes in her own life and an evocation of a nation's past and its present.
This is the first collection of Robert Lowell's poetry which reveals a writer of unmistakeable brilliance who has a profound insight into the human condition.
The first book of poetry by Matthias Göritz to be available in English, in a translation by a renowned writer
Very few books of poetry by contemporary German writers are available to English-speaking readers. In Colonies of Paradise, acclaimed poet and translator Mary Jo Bang introduces the poems of novelist, poet, and translator Matthias Göritz, one of the most exciting German writers publishing today. The poems in this book, which originally appeared in German under the title Loops, take the reader on a tour of Paris, Chicago, Hamburg, and Moscow as they explore childhood, travel, and the human experience. Unsettling our expectations about adulthood, the book permeates the quotidian with a disquieting strangeness that leads us deeper into our own lives and histories. Göritz's sly humor, keen insight, and artistry are brought to the fore in Bang's careful and innovative translation, allowing an English-language audience to enter fully the intricate interiority of Göritz's work.
2015 Pulitzer Prize finalist
"Compass Rose [is] a collection in which the poet uses capacious intelligence and lyrical power to offer a dazzling picture of our inter-connected world."--Pulitzer Prize finalist announcement
[Sze] brings together disparate realms of experience--astronomy, botany, anthropology, Taoism--and observes their correspondences with an exuberant attentiveness."--The New Yorker
A child playing a game, tea leaves resting in a bowl, an abandoned dog, a foot sticking out from a funeral pyre, an Afghan farmer pausing as mortars fire at the enemy: in Arthur Sze's tenth book, the world spins on many points of reference, unfolding with full sensuous detail.
Arthur Sze is the author of The Ginkgo Light (2009), Quipu (2005), and The Redshifting Web (1998). He lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
From Leaves of Grass to Song of Myself, all of Whitman's poetry in one volume
In 1855 Walt Whitman published Leaves of Grass, the work that defined him as one of America's most influential voices and that he added to throughout his life. A collection of astonishing originality and intensity, it spoke of politics, sexual emancipation, and what it meant to be an American. From the joyful "Song of Myself" and "I Sing the Body Electric" to the elegiac "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd," Whitman's art fuses oratory, journalism, and song in a vivid celebration of humanity. Containing all Whitman's known poetic work, this edition reprints the final, or "deathbed," edition of Leaves of Grass (1891-92). Earlier versions of many poems are also given, including the 1855 "Song of Myself." - Features a completely new--and fuller--introduction discussing the development of Whitman's poetic career, his influence on later American poets, and his impact on the American cultural sensibility- Includes chronology, updated suggestions for further reading, and extensive notes For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
From the joy and anguish of her own experience, Sexton fashioned poems that told truths about the inner lives of men and women.
"Women poets in particular owe a debt to Anne Sexton, who broke new ground, shattered taboos, and endured a barrage of attacks along the way because of the flamboyance of her subject matter...Sexton has earned her place in the canon."--from the Foreword by Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Maxine Kumin
You would leave me eternally.
You smiled at my fears, saying
I could not stay in your lap forever"
This collection also includes the never-before-published poem "Amazement Awaits," commissioned for the 2008 Olympic Games: "We are here at the portal of the world we had wished for
At the lintel of the world we most need.
We are here roaring and singing.
We prove that we can not only make peace, we can bring it with us." Timeless and prescient, this definitive compendium will warm the hearts of Maya Angelou's most ardent admirers as it introduces new readers to the legendary poet, activist, and teacher--a phenomenal woman for the ages.