For the Living & the Dead: New Poems and a Memoir - Hardcover

TRANSTROMER

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0880014369 ISBN 13: 9780880014366

Publisher: ECCO Press, 1995

Synopsis

With this new volume of poetry, Tomas Transtromer once again demonstrates his gift for capturing and grounding the elusive, luminous details of our modern world. As its title suggests, For the Living and the Dead works to bridge the space between those real and unreal elements of life, suggesting that a surprising, redemptive cohesion can exist within a universe of opposing forces.

Transtromer has referred to his poems as "meeting places," with "their intent to make a sudden connection between aspects of reality that conventional languages and outlooks ordinarily keep apart. Large and small details of the landscape meet, divided cultures and people flow together in a work of art. . ." People and objects alike are given a certain weightiness, their presence filled with a potential carefully measured by the poet's eye and quietly attested to by his language. In "Vermeer," "The airy sky has taken its place leaning against the wall. /It is like a prayer to what is empty./ And what is empty turns its face to us/ and whispers/ 'I am not empty, I am open.'"

This volume combines Transtromer's recent poetry with a prose memoir of his childhood in Sweden, written in the same careful, unsentimental voice for which he is so beloved. Through this memoir the author reveals himself as a curious, sensitive child, interested in archeology and insects, terrified of school and his authoritarian teachers.

Characterized by the insight and integrity we have come to expect from his work, For the Living and the Dead confirms Tomas Transtromer as one of the most significant living poets writing in any language.

About this title

About the Author

Tomas Transtromer, winner of the 2011 Nobel Prize in Literature, is one of the most celebrated and influential poetic figures of his generation. He was born in Stockholm in 1931 and educated at the Sodra Latin School and the University of Stockholm, where he received a degree in psychology. He began his psychology career in the early 1960s at Roxtuna, a juvenile corrections institute in Sweden, and worked for several decades in the field. Since the publication of 17 Dikter (17 Poems) in 1954, Transtromer has written eleven full-length collections of poetry, most recently Den stora gatan (The Vast Enigma) in 2004. He is one of the world's most translated poets (with books appearing in numerous editions in over fifty languages). In addition to his renown as a poet, Transtromer is also a highly regarded concert pianist and entomologist. He lives with his wife in Stockholm.

Synopsis

Recent poems and a prose memoir by the noted contemporary Swedish poet, translated by Samuel Charters, Robin Fulton, Malena M rling, and Robert Bly. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

Edition details

• Publisher: ECCO Press
• Publication date: 1995
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0880014369
• ISBN 13: 9780880014366
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 71