Selected Poems

The Selected Poems of René Char is a comprehensive, bilingual overview reflecting the poet’s wide stylistic and philosophical range, from aphorism to dramatic lyricism. In making their selections, the editors have chosen the voices of seventeen poets and translators (Paul Auster, Samuel Beckett, Cid Corman, Eugene Jolas, W.S. Merwin, William Carlos Williams, and James Wright, to name a few), in homage to a writer long held in highest esteem by the literary avant-garde.

An interesting feature of this book is the number of contributing translators (19, editors included) who are themselves well-known poets or writers: they include Samuel Beckett, William Carlos Williams, and James Wright, to name just three. Another felicitous choice by the editors is the book's bilingual format; each original poem and its translation appear side by side, so that Char's (1907-88) many feelings, moods, and tones are captured in those 99 selected poems. Char's poems have already been translated ( Poems of Rene Char, LJ 6/1/76), but the earlier translation does not include such a chorus of voices. Indeed, the reader will find this latest publication a useful contribution to the understanding of a poet whose artistic voice found its initial expression among the surrealists and whose craft developed into an intensely personal style, various and multiform, fiercely independent yet based on universally human concerns. Recommended for informed readers.
- Danielle Mihram, Univ. of Southern California Lib., Los Angeles
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