In the London Review of Books of 26 April, Colin Burrow reviewed three translations of the Odyssey, the most recent one being Emily Wilson’s, here. After reading it I felt that Burrow had missed out on a further major recent translation, that done by Charles Stein, & for once decided to send a letter to the editor. The lrb responded with what I take is its usual email, … Read more A Brief Odyssey of Various Odyssey translations & the lrb
André du Bouchet Openwork: poetry and prose. Selected, translated and presented by Paul Auster and Hoyt Rogers. Yale University Press | Hardcover 364pp. (Bilingual text) |$26.00/£16.99 By PETER RILEY. ANDRÉ DU BOUCHET’s is the most difficult poetry to describe or characterise; it eludes identification from start to finish and you’re liable to end up speaking entirely in negatives. The poetry doesn’t describe or recount or expound; it doesn’t narrate … Read more Peter Riley on André du Bouchet
As I put it on Face Book a week or so ago when Aldon Nielsen’s review of SOS (Poems 1961-2013) came out: “An excellent corrective to the ignorant NYT put-down piece of a week ago. Aldon Nielsen knows exactly what he is speaking of, i.e. knows in detail the incredible width & depth of Amiri Baraka’s oeuvre — one of the major literary achievements of the second part of … Read more Aldon Nielsen on Amiri Baraka’s SOS (Poems 1961-2013)
Peter Riley is a poet & commentator whose work I follow with much pleasure & gain. His latest column for the Fortnightly Review is available HERE & here is how Peter describes it: It concerns poets pulled or self-propelled part-way or more towards the “advanced poetry” climate in UK, especially its ex-Cambridge (anti-lyric) flavour, set against a poet from quite elsewhere who by cultivating the history of an interceding … Read more On UK lyric, anti-lyric, and political poetry.