All About Books discussion

It is almost time to pick our next seasonal poet, which for most of us will be a poet in translation. Greg and I thought we'd look at the Polish poets that Ruth Franklin recently called three of the greatest European poets of the last half-century in an article that you can read here

Czesław Miłosz
Wisława Szymborska
Zbigniew Herbert

What unites all of them is that they've been witnesses of war and communism which has influenced their poetry greatly in different ways. In order to make it a bit easier to vote for one of them come 25th of May when the poll will open, we thought we'd give you a little impression of the life and work of each of them. I've added a poem for each, for further reading I recommend http://www.poetryfoundation.org/ or use our list of useful links here in message 2 of the thread I've linked.

Czesław Miłosz (1911-2004)

Czeslaw Milosz ranks among the most respected figures in twentieth-century Polish literature, as well as one of the most respected contemporary poets in the world: he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1980. Born in Lithuania, where his parents moved temporarily to escape the political upheaval in their native Poland, as an adult, he left Poland due to the oppressive Communist regime that came to power following World War II and lived in the United States from 1960 until his death in 2004. Milosz’s poems, novels, essays, and other works are written in his native Polish and translated by the author and others into English. Having lived under the two great totalitarian systems of modern history, national socialism and communism, Milosz wrote of the past in a tragic, ironic style that nonetheless affirmed the value of human life. (poetryfoundation.org)

for further reading (the entire article is long but really informative go here or read about him in The Guardian. Of course there's also a Wiki

Here is one of his poems. It should be added that Milosz translated or co-translated much of his poetry himself.

Dedication
by Czeslaw Milosz

You whom I could not save
Listen to me.
Try to understand this simple speech as I would be ashamed of another.
I swear, there is in me no wizardry of words.
I speak to you with silence like a cloud or a tree.

What strengthened me, for you was lethal.
You mixed up farewell to an epoch with the beginning of a new one,
Inspiration of hatred with lyrical beauty;
Blind force with accomplished shape.

Here is a valley of shallow Polish rivers. And an immense bridge
Going into white fog. Here is a broken city;
And the wind throws the screams of gulls on your grave
When I am talking with you.

What is poetry which does not save
Nations or people?
A connivance with official lies,
A song of drunkards whose throats will be cut in a moment,
Readings for sophomore girls.
That I wanted good poetry without knowing it,
That I discovered, late, its salutary aim,
In this and only this I find salvation.

They used to pour millet on graves or poppy seeds
To feed the dead who would come disguised as birds.
I put this book here for you, who once lived
So that you should visit us no more.

The Collected Poems: 1931-1987 (The Ecco Press, 1988)
Warsaw, 1945

Wisława Szymborska (1923-2012)

Well-known in her native Poland, Wisława Szymborska received international recognition when she won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1996. In awarding the prize, the Academy praised her “poetry that with ironic precision allows the historical and biological context to come to light in fragments of human reality.” (poetryfoundation.org)

the first article in this thread by Ruth Franklin speaks about her poetry:
Szymborska often said that her poems were “strictly not political … more about people and life.” She earned the epithet “the Mozart of poetry” for brief, playful poems that take the quotidian and spin it in an unexpected direction: “Cat in an Empty Apartment” (in which the death of the cat’s owner is experienced from the perspective of his adored pet), “Love at First Sight” (a poem about missed connections that apparently inspired Krzysztof Kieslowski’s film Red), “The Onion” (this one can’t be described; it must simply be read). These poems are the reason why even people who otherwise know little about either poetry or Poland often know Szymborska’s poetry, if not how to pronounce her name. “Her poems may not save the world, but that world never looks quite the same after encountering [her] work,” the American poet Edward Hirsch (who has dedicated at least one poem to Szymborska) has written.

for further reading: an article by the Guardian or her Wiki


Advertisement
by Wisława Szymborska

I’m a tranquilizer.
I’m effective at home.
I work in the office.
I can take exams
on the witness stand.
I mend broken cups with care.
All you have to do is take me,
let me melt beneath your tongue,
just gulp me
with a glass of water.

I know how to handle misfortune,
how to take bad news.
I can minimize injustice,
lighten up God’s absence,
or pick the widow’s veil that suits your face.
What are you waiting for—
have faith in my chemical compassion.

You’re still a young man/woman.
It’s not too late to learn how to unwind.
Who said
you have to take it on the chin?

Let me have your abyss.
I’ll cushion it with sleep.
You’ll thank me for giving you
four paws to fall on.

Sell me your soul.
There are no other takers.

There is no other devil anymore.

Translated By Stanisław Barańczak and Clare Cavanagh Source: Poems New and Collected (Harcourt Inc., 1998)

last year Dhanaraj also shared a poem of her's here

Zbigniew Herbert (1924-1998)

"One of Poland's most honored and influential poets," as Robert Hudzik describes him in Library Journal, Zbigniew Herbert enjoys an international reputation. His poetry, marked by a direct language and a strong moral concern, is shaped by his experiences under both the Nazi and Soviet dictatorships. As Bogdana Carpenter writes in World Literature Today, "from his extremely destructive experiences Herbert manages to draw constructive conclusions, and he builds a bridge between realms that seem to be irreconcilable: the past and the present, suffering and poetry." (poetryfoundation.org)

and Laurence Lieberman writes
"The most distinctive quality of Herbert's imagination, is his power to invest impish fantasy, mischievously tender nonsense, with the highest seriousness. His humorous fantasy is the armor of a superlatively healthy mind staving off political oppression. Fantasy is an instrument of survival: it is the chief weapon in a poetry arsenal which serves as a caretaker for the individual identity, a bulwark against the mental slavery of the totalitarian church and state." (Poetry Magazin)

read his bio on poetryfoundation here in full or more about his life and work at words without borders or his Wiki


The Rain
by Zbigniew Herbert

When my older brother
came back from war
he had on his forehead a little silver star
and under the star
an abyss

a splinter of shrapnel
hit him at Verdun
or perhaps at Grünwald
(he’d forgotten the details)

he used to talk much
in many languages
but he liked most of all
the language of history

until losing breath
he commanded his dead pals to run
Roland Kowaski Hannibal

he shouted
that this was the last crusade
that Carthage soon would fall
and then sobbing confessed
that Napoleon did not like him

we looked at him
getting paler and paler
abandoned by his senses
he turned slowly into a monument

into musical shells of ears
entered a stone forest
and the skin of his face
was secured
with the blind dry
buttons of eyes

nothing was left him
but touch

what stories
he told with his hands
in the right he had romances
in the left soldier’s memories

they took my brother
and carried him out of town
he returns every fall
slim and very quiet
he does not want to come in
he knocks at the window for me

we walk together in the streets
and he recites to me
improbable tales
touching my face
with blind fingers of rain

translated by Czeslaw Milosz and Peter Dale Scott, Source: Selected Poems of Zbigniew Herbert (The Ecco Press, 1985)

Interesting category -- I will have a hard time deciding! Thanks for all the information and links Jenny. I thought "Oh I will pick this one" after reading each of the poems so clearly any of them would be an excellent choice ;)

I want all three, please!

I love 'Dedication' and his other poems so I know where my vote will be.

Will we get a reminder on 25th ?

Thank you for the background info, links, and poems. Looks like a tough choice, but that also means any will be rewarding to study. Will try to cast a vote if I can choose.

Very hard to choose between them, I thought the same as Leslie as I read each choice!

I have the same, though I think I've made my choice now, but would be happy for any of them to become our next Seasonal Poet. Theoretically we could take all three and focus on how they've digested their shared history in different ways through their poetry, but I am afraid it would be a bit much to handle maybe.

B the BookAddict wrote: "Will we get a reminder on 25th ?"

Yes, definitely!

and we have a winner: our next Seasonal Poet will be Czesław Miłosz

Looking forward to reading more Milosz! I wonder if anyone has read a fair amount of Milosz and could recommend a good book for me?

I suppose I can just start with a selected or collected poems, but sometimes it can be hard to tell when purchasing online what the translation will actually be like.

I was a bit disappointed in Road-side Dog, but I was told afterwards that was not one of his best.

@ Greg: I have read two books by Milosz - one a poetry collection (Selected and Last Poems 1931 2004) and the other an essay collection (To Begin Where I Am: Selected Essays). Both were excellent.

I just purchased Selected and Last Poems. It's 800 pages so I don't think I will read it all but I hope to dip in and read a few

Dhanaraj wrote: "@ Greg: I have read two books by Milosz - one a poetry collection (Selected and Last Poems 1931 2004) and the other an essay collection..."

Thanks so much Dhanaraj! I think I'll start with Selected and Last Poems 1931 2004.

Jenny wrote: "and we have a winner: our next Seasonal Poet will be Czesław Miłosz"

I looked for his poetry in my library today but they didn't have any (or at least not in any of the sections I looked). I'll have to see what I can get through interlibrary loan.