Of all the horrors of this benighted century, the genocide of the Yazidis at the hands of ISIS a decade ago stands out for its extreme brutality and inhumanity. At the time, few people outside the region were aware of the group’s existence; as non-Muslims (Yazidism has pre-Zoroastrian roots), Yazidis were specifically targeted. The world has by now, alas, largely moved on to other atrocities.
Category Archive: Poetry
A collection of 49 poems of varying forms, from scattered verses to prose poetry, Primordial is more than the sum of its parts. Mai Der Vang, equipped with the eloquence and talent for crafting vivid imagery that had made her previous collection a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, brings together the overlaying experiences of the Hmong people, ravaged and displaced by war, and of the elusive, ethereal, endangered saola, a rare species of bovine with a pair of long sword-like horns that only came to be known and classified in scientific terms in 1992.
Renowned poet and Hebrew translator of Greek drama, Aharon Shabtai, now 85, has a new collection, Requiem and Other Poems, translated by Peter Cole, that spans the early years of Israel to the days just after 7 October 2023. The book, although concise at just 87 pages, provides a vivid and comprehensive look at a writer who has spent his life promoting peace.
Li Qingzhao (1084-1151 CE) is considered the greatest woman poet in Chinese history but, as translator Wendy Chen writes in her introduction, Li “remains relatively unknown in the West.” Chen, who first heard Li’s poetry as a child, is determined to help change this. The Magpie at Night is Chen’s translation of the Song-dynasty writer in a collection of poetry that feels both of its era but also carries a timeliness that renders Li’s poetry as accessible as it is moving.
Who is Shuzo Takiguchi? Neglected and out of print for decades in Japan, ignored by the anglophone world, awareness of his contributions to 20th century Japanese writing and fine arts is long overdue. Profoundly influenced by French surrealism, Takiguchi’s heady mix of mythological rumination and avant-garde modernist poetry has finally been made available to an international audience with the bilingual publication of A Kiss for the Absolute: Selected Poems of Shuzo Takiguchi, translated by poets Mary Jo Bang and Yuki Tanaka. Meticulously harvested from a cache comprising a ten-year period of intense literary composition from 1927-1937, this edition of thirty-five poems gives needed shape to Takiguchi’s wide-ranging legacy as an eclectic visionary—critic, translator, poet, artist, collector, curator.
As an award-winning novelist, Jeet Thayil may need little introduction, but given that I’ll Have It Here is his first collection in a decade and a half, some readers may need some reminding that he is also an accomplished poet.
After viewing American painter Agnes Martin’s “Untitled IX, 1982”, a work of irregular, horizontal pencil lines that are nuanced and experimental, with a subtle hue of pink underneath, poet Victoria Chang was moved to contemplate the struggle to embrace or appreciate her racial identity: “To be an Asian woman is to be seen as night… Some people assume Asian women are made of flowers, but some of us are made of lines.”
The Mesopotamian high priestess Enheduana lived over 4,000 years ago, but her words ring down to the present: “I am Enheduana.”
Sikhism, born in India, about six centuries ago, is not a religion that has travelled far and wide the way Buddhism did in ancient times, and Hinduism continues to do even today through concepts of yoga, karma and so on. As the Sikh diaspora in the West struggles with its identity in contemporary times, there has been a deep interest in revisiting the roots of the community through pursuits in history and fiction. In The Sacred Hymns of Guru Nanak, Nirmal Gill approaches the subject of Sikh ethos and heritage through translation.
Hebrew is unique, an ancient tongue that was all but lost for millennia as a spoken language, but was revitalized in the late 19th century and is now the official language of Israel, a country of nine million. Despite this relatively small number of native speakers, Hebrew literature is robust, yet Hebrew literature in English translation remains rare. So it’s unusual to see two new poetry collections come out around the same time. A Winding Line: Three Hebrew Poets by Maya Bejerano, Sharron Hass, and Anat Zecharia, translated by Tsipi Keller and So Many Things are Yours by Admiel Kosman, translated by Lisa Katz include a unique combination of poems that borrow from Old Testament stories and contemporary Israeli life, including politics.
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