The Collected Poems, 1957-1987

by Octavio Paz, Eliot Weinberger (Editor), Elizabeth Bishop (Translator)

Nobel Laureate Octavio Paz is incontestably Latin America's foremost poet. The Collected Poems of Octavio Paz is a landmark bilingual gathering of all the poetry he has published in book form since 1952, the year of his premier long poem, Sunstone (Piedra de Sol)―here translated anew by Eliot Weinberger―made its appearance. This is followed by the complete texts of Days and Occasions (Días Hábiles), Homage and Desecrations (Homenaje y Profanaciones), Salamander (Salamandra), Solo for Two Voices (Solo a Dos Voces), East Slope (Ladera Este), Toward the Beginning (Hacza el Comienzo), Blanco, Topoems (Topoemas), Return (Vuelta), A Draft of Shadows (Pasado en Claro), Airborn (Hijos del Aire), and Paz's most recent collection, A Tree Within (Árbol Adentro).

With additional translations by Elizabeth Bishop, Paul Blackburn, Lysander Kemp, Denise Levertov, John Frederick Nims, and Charles Tomlinson.

Genres: Poetry, Spanish Literature, Literature, Nobel Prize, Classics, Fiction, Latin American Literature

669 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1991

About the author

Octavio Paz Lozano was a Mexican writer, poet, and diplomat, and the winner of the 1982 Neustadt International Prize for Literature and the 1990 Nobel Prize for Literature ("for impassioned writing with wide horizons, characterized by sensuous intelligence and humanistic integrity.")

Reviews

[Edita · Rating 5 out of 5]

time that comes back in a swell of sea,
time that recedes without turning its head,
the past is not past, it is still passing by,
flowing silently into the next vanishing moment :
*
On the whitewashed wall
a play written by the wind and light
the shadows of the vines
greener than the word March
the mask of the afternoon
absorbed in the calligraphy of birds
*
Bit by bit the day burns out
over the erasing landscape
your shadow is a land of birds
the sun scatters with a wave

[Steven Godin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Preface

SUNSTONE (1957)
DAYS AND OCCASIONS (1958-1961)
HOMAGE AND DESECRATIONS (1960)
SALAMANDER (1958-1961)
SOLO FOR TWO VOICES (1961)
EAST SLOPE (1962-1968)
TOWARD THE BEGINNING (1964-1968)
TOPOEMS (1968)
RETURN (1969-1975)
A DRAFT OF SHADOWS (1974)
AIRBORN (1979)
A TREE WITHIN (1976-1987)

Author's Notes
Paz in English
Index of Titles


-----------


Shadow of the sun sickle sunshadow
casts over my downcast well
unknots the knot mows down desire
unflames this heartsick heart

Yet dismembered memory swims
from the birthspring of nothing
from the wellspring of birth
swims against the current and commands

swims against nothing

****

Everyone's words that each says to himself
I begged that they would always be with me
human reason
the animal with radiant hands
the animal with eyes in its fingertips

The night gathers and expands
a knot of time a cluster of space
I see I hear I breathe
I beg for obedience to this day and night

****

My wife sleeps.
She too is a moon,
a clarity that travels
not between the reefs of the clouds,
but between the rocks and wracks of dreams:
she too is a soul.
She flows below her closed eyes,
a silent torrent
rushing down
from her forehead to her feet,
she tumbles within,
bursts out from within,
her heartbeats sculpt her,
traveling through herself
she invents herself,
inventing herself
she copies it,
she is an arm of the sea
between the islands of her breasts,
her belly a lagoon
where darkness and its foliage
grow pale,
she flows through her shape,
rises,
falls,
scatters in herself,
ties
herself to her flowing,
disperses in her form:
she too is a body.

****

To wait for night I have stretched out
in the shade of a tree of heartbeats.

The tree is a woman and in its leaves
I hear the sea rolling under the day.

I eat its fruits with the taste of time,
fruits of forgetting and fruits of knowledge.

Under the tree they look and touch,
images, ideas and words.

We return through the body to the beginning,
spiral of stillness and motion.

Taste, mortal knowledge, finite pause,
has a beginning and end—and is measureless.

Night comes in and covers us with its tide;
the sea repeats its syllables, now black.

****

Motionless sun,
the enormous space of spread wings;
over the flat stretches of reflections
thirst raises transparent minarets.
You are neither asleep nor awake:
you float in a time without hours.
A breeze barely stirs
the distant lands of mint and fountains.
Let yourself be carried by these words
toward yourself.

****

Perhaps to love is to learn
to walk through this world.
To learn to be silent
like the oak and the linden of the fable.
To learn to see.
Your glance scatters seeds.
It planted a tree.
I talk
because you shake its leaves.

[Brian Brogan · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favorite poetry books, after decades of reading hundreds of poets - or more....

[Sara · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sunstone is one of the most beautiful poems I've ever read. EVER.

[Narjes Dorzade · Rating 5 out of 5]

.
سایه های روز سپید
در برابر چشمان من
من نمی بینم ، چیزی به جز سپید :
زمان سپید ،جانی رها شده ، از شور ،
از زمان .
.
" اوکتاویو پاز "
فارسی فواد نظیری

[KamRun · Rating 4 out of 5]

این امتیاز برای کتاب هست و نه این ترجمه. یک مقایسه سرسری بین ترجمه های احمد شاملو، آقای میرعلایی، باهار افسری، ترجمه‌ی مشکوک یغما گلرویی و کتاب حاضر برای نشان دادن ضعف ترجمه کافی ست. امتیاز ترجمه آقای نظیری 1.5 از 5

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favorite poet, Paz reads like watercolor paintings of Mexico. The sensuality and imagery are amazing. He’s a master of connotation and flow. It’s the kind of poetry you savor.

[Cciccolella · Rating 5 out of 5]

he takes me oh does he take me
reading it in spanish oh does he take me
reading him in english he took me

[Marieke]

My dad gave this to me in high school in hopes that i would be fluent in Spanish by the end. That didn't happen. but i'm curious to see if he has a point. I should find my copy and get crackin'. i'm sure that will delight numerous Spanish-speakers if i talk with them by reciting lines of Paz's poems. Dios mio! Ese gringa es loca!

[Rómulo · Rating 5 out of 5]

En la poesía de Octavio Paz giran, avanzan, se detienen y abrazan todas las constelaciones.

[امیرمحمد حیدری · Rating 3 out of 5]

از اینکه پیشنهاد علی‌سورنا را برای خوانش شعر عملی کردم، اصلاً پشیمان نیستم و به‌دو دلیل بسیار لذت بردم. اول اینکه شعرها به‌خودی خود، خیلی‌خیلی غنی بودند، با صناعات زیبا، ترجمه‌ی فوق‌العاده و معانی نهفته و آشکاری که برای ملت شعر همیشه گرم است. و دوم اینکه می‌شد سورنا را در لابه‌لای خطوط پیدا کرد؛ چنان‌که الهام‌گرفتنش از تک‌تک اشعار بسیار آشکار است.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Poetry, the suspension bridge between history and truth, is not a road going here or there:
it is to see the quietness in its movement, the change in its quietness."
from "Vuelta"

This is a complete collection of poems from the latter part of Octavio Paz's life. The works include all his published collections such as"Sunstone" as well as "East Slope", reflections on his time as the ambassador for Mexico to India. The gamut runs wide - from Buddha to reflection on Robert Motherwell paintings to word play pieces like "Blanco" and "Topoems". He co-wrote a beautiful piece in the Japanese style of renga with Charles Tomlinson called "Hijos del Aire" which does soar in imagery and playfulness.

I have read and thoroughly enjoyed his masterpiece "Labyrinths of Solitude", his great essay on Mexico but never read his poetry till now (he won the Nobel Prize in 1990). His word play, his reflections on language is mesmerizing and intriguing. Sometimes I would read it aloud just for the shear joy of the sound of the Spanish. Of course Eliot Weinberger and company does a fine job in the translation area. This is a book to return to many times.

[Laura Mckinney · Rating 4 out of 5]

The beauty of Spanish language is clearly illustrated here as readers peruse Paz' poetry in both English and Spanish. Paz takes simple nature themes and weaves them into a spiritual mythology for a hungry soul.

[ZaRi]

میان حالا و حال
میان هستم و هستی
واژه پل
با ورود به آن
به درون خود می آیی:
جهان حلقه وار
به هم بر می آید
و بسته می شود
از کرانه ای به کرانه دیگر
پیوسته پیکری آرمیده است:
رنگین کمانی.
به زیر طاق هایش خواهم خفت

[Kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

paz nestles some doozies in this one. scattered throughout the big book are gems serving as prizes for your dedication and search. he rides on the outwave of surrealism, good stuff.

[Mike · Rating 5 out of 5]

cool water poured down my neck on humid days

love in the madhouse

[Casey · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my all time favorite wordsmiths. Beautifully compiled and showcased.

[Scott Weyandt · Rating 5 out of 5]

The real is fragile, and is inconstant:
It’s law is restless change:

the wheel of appearances turns and turns
over it’s fixed axis of time.

The light draws it all, and all is on fire,
It nails to the sea daggers that are torches,

It makes of the world a pyre of reflections:
we are only the whitecaps on the water

…

I eat it’s fruits with the taste of time,
fruits of forgetting and fruits of knowledge.

Under the tree they look and touch,
Images, ideas, words.

We return through the body to the beginning,
Spiral of stillness and motion.

Taste, mortal knowledge, finite pause,
has a beginning and an end—it is measureless.

Night comes in and covers us with its tide;
the sea repeats its syllables, now black.

From Quartet

[Shokufeh شکوفه Kavani کاوانی · Rating 5 out of 5]

آیا این حس را تجربه کرده ائ که موقع خواندن یک کتاب فقط بگریی چرا که کلمات حدیث قلب توست ؟

[Will · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Everything is a door/ all one needs is the light push of a thought"

[Michael A. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent surrealist poetry. Though there are a lot of poems some themes that seem to recur throughout are love/sex (eros i guess), time, space, language, and a little bit of philosophy. he has very evocative, original and creative ways of expressing himself and you definitely start to get a feel for his style. I guess if I had one critique is that his style doesn't evolve much in these 30 years, but it doesn't really need to, but I can imagine it getting repetitive. For me the length was just right, if it was a section or two longer I think it would have been too long.

[Al · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Fantastic Collection of Work. If anyone is a fan of Latin Culture, Eastern Philosophy, or Poetry, then you must read this. Take your time, eat slowly, and digest fully. It has both the Spanish original and the English translation. This is a must have in any library for great poetry, great quotes, and to just expand one's horizon. Wonderful -wonderful.

[Christopher Flynn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm reading this in Spanish a little each night, out loud. The main point is to get better at pronouncing Spanish, move towards half fluency, but the poetry is a revelation. Someone like Paz shouldn't be a revelation, but I've never read his poetry. He plays with language in a way I never notice in Neruda, Borges and Garcia Lorca, the three Spanish-language poets I know the best.

[Andrea · Rating 4 out of 5]

Me encanta! Un buen Poeta :) Great Spanish poet, he is the king of making words come alive that sound good together and they totally paint a picture of what he wants to tell us. I haven't read a lot of Spanish lit. lately and this is defenitely a classic collection. :) El Espanol es lindo!

[Gabe Redel · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection has the Spanish version of the poems right along side the English translation. I still want to learn Spanish so that I can read the original, but I did really enjoy the English translations.

[Tara · Rating 5 out of 5]

for favorite poems, see http://www.poetrypagetat.blogspot.com/

[Leonardo Rodríguez · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dijo Paz: “Más vale un gramo de poesía que cien toneladas de retórica”. Este libro tiene casi tantos gramos de poesía como páginas.

[Patrick Rossi · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are no words!!! I well try to expand!!! Thank you Tate!
octavio won the nobel for a reason.

[l · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some of the poems are just divine. I always find the longer list-like poems a bit hard to grasp though.

[Jessica Bang · Rating 5 out of 5]

The last section, "Arbol Adentro/A Tree Within (1976-1987)," is particularly phenomenal. There are gems in here that I will definitely revisit time and time again.