Overview

Published for the centenary of his birth, a gathering of lucid, intensely lyrical poetry from one of the twentieth century's pre-eminent literary voices be courageous when reason fails you be courageous in the final reckoning it is the only thing that counts Zbigniew Herbert was one of the best-known and most-translated poets of post-war Poland, opposed alike to Communism, Fascism, nationalism and the Church, yet moved, throughout his work, by 'a powerful sense of right and wrong without a corresponding belief in a system' (New York Times). His is a poetry of compression, lucidity and profound humanity. The universe he conjures is deeply informed not only by his own time, but by history - by that of the Medieval Mediterranean and Central Europe, as much as of the Classical world - and by a taste for historical and philosophical paradox. In the early and middle works, the figure of the trickster never seems far from view. Throughout, Herbert asks questions about the nature and needs of sentient beings. His desire, always, is to 'touch the essence'- to get to the heart of life. Selected and introduced by J. M. Coetzee and Alissa Valles, this outstanding gathering from the full range of Herbert's poetic output invites readers to experience the beauty and profundity of a remarkable body of work.

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9780241654613

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Herbert’s voice is gathered, uncensored, and unimaginably strong, in one dynamic volume * San Francisco Chronicle * Not merely the best Polish writer in recent memory but one of the most impressive poets of the later-twentieth century … It leaves no doubt about the place of Herbert’s work in twentieth-century letter, which rivals that of W. H. Auden or Elizabeth Bishops in its originality, imaginative breadth, and human vigilance * The Washington Post Book World * Herbert’s poems, even in English, seem to me finer than anything currently being written by any English or American poet * The New York Review of Books * Herbert is a poet with all the strength of Antaeus … He shoulders the whole sky and the scope of human dignity with responsibility -- Seamus Heaney

Not merely the best Polish writer in recent memory but one of the most impressive poets of the later-twentieth century … It leaves no doubt about the place of Herbert’s work in twentieth-century letter, which rivals that of W. H. Auden or Elizabeth Bishops in its originality, imaginative breadth, and human vigilance * The Washington Post Book World * Herbert’s poems, even in English, seem to me finer than anything currently being written by any English or American poet * The New York Review of Books * Herbert is a poet with all the strength of Antaeus … He shoulders the whole sky and the scope of human dignity with responsibility -- Seamus Heaney

Herbert’s poems, even in English, seem to me finer than anything currently being written by any English or American poet * The New York Review of Books * Herbert is a poet with all the strength of Antaeus … He shoulders the whole sky and the scope of human dignity with responsibility -- Seamus Heaney

Author Information

Zbigniew Herbert was born in Lw w, Poland, in 1924, and studied law, economics and philosophy at the universities of Krakow, Torun, and Warsaw. His books include Report from the Besieged City and Other Poems, Mr Cogito, Still Life with a Bridle and The King of the Ants. He died in 1998.

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