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C. P. Cavafy: Collected Poems : Horror Book Reviews
Title: C. P. Cavafy: Collected Poems
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Author: C.P. Cavafy
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Review of C. P. Cavafy: Collected Poems
An extraordinary literary event: the simultaneous publication of a brilliant and vivid new rendering of C. P. Cavafy’s Collected Poems andthe first-ever English translation of the poet’s thirty Unfinished Poems, both featuring the fullest literary commentaries available in English—by the acclaimed critic, scholar, and award-winning author of The Lost.
No modern poet brought so vividly to life the history and culture of Mediterranean antiquity; no writer dared break, with such taut energy, the early-twentieth-century taboos surrounding homoerotic desire; no poet before or since has so gracefully melded elegy and irony as the Alexandrian Greek poet Constantine Cavafy (1863–1933). Now, after more than a decade of work and study, and with the cooperation of the Cavafy Archive in Athens, Daniel Mendelsohn—a classics scholar who alone among Cavafy’s translators shares the poet’s deep intimacy with the ancient world—is uniquely positioned to give readers full access to Cavafy’s genius. And we hear for the first time the remarkable music of his poetry: the sensuous rhymes, rich assonances, and strong rhythms of the original Greek that have eluded previous translators.
The more than 250 works collected in this volume, comprising all of the Published, Repudiated, and Unpublished poems, cover the vast sweep of Hellenic civilization, from the Trojan War through Cavafy’s own lifetime. Powerfully moving, searching and wise, whether advising Odysseus as he returns home to Ithaca or portraying a doomed Marc Antony on the eve of his death, Cavafy’s poetry brilliantly makes the historical personal—and vice versa. He brings to his profound exploration of longing and loneliness, fate and loss, memory and identity the historian’s assessing eye as well as the poet’s compassionate heart.
With its in-depth introduction and a helpful commentary that situates each work in a rich historical, literary, and biographical context, this revelatory new translation, together with The Unfinished Poems, is a cause for celebration—the definitive presentation of Cavafy in English.
No modern poet brought so vividly to life the history and culture of Mediterranean antiquity; no writer dared break, with such taut energy, the early-twentieth-century taboos surrounding homoerotic desire; no poet before or since has so gracefully melded elegy and irony as the Alexandrian Greek poet Constantine Cavafy (1863–1933). Now, after more than a decade of work and study, and with the cooperation of the Cavafy Archive in Athens, Daniel Mendelsohn—a classics scholar who alone among Cavafy’s translators shares the poet’s deep intimacy with the ancient world—is uniquely positioned to give readers full access to Cavafy’s genius. And we hear for the first time the remarkable music of his poetry: the sensuous rhymes, rich assonances, and strong rhythms of the original Greek that have eluded previous translators.
The more than 250 works collected in this volume, comprising all of the Published, Repudiated, and Unpublished poems, cover the vast sweep of Hellenic civilization, from the Trojan War through Cavafy’s own lifetime. Powerfully moving, searching and wise, whether advising Odysseus as he returns home to Ithaca or portraying a doomed Marc Antony on the eve of his death, Cavafy’s poetry brilliantly makes the historical personal—and vice versa. He brings to his profound exploration of longing and loneliness, fate and loss, memory and identity the historian’s assessing eye as well as the poet’s compassionate heart.
With its in-depth introduction and a helpful commentary that situates each work in a rich historical, literary, and biographical context, this revelatory new translation, together with The Unfinished Poems, is a cause for celebration—the definitive presentation of Cavafy in English.
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Comments for C. P. Cavafy: Collected Poems
- Posted on 2009-09-10
Powerful Poems
I think this must be a really good translation. I read a review to that effect. But the few poems I have read are SO powerful. He is a great writer. I am not really a poetry person, but find Cavafy so emotionally evocative.
- Posted on 2009-08-07
Hellenic peotry.
If you enjoy themes of ancient and Byzantine Greece you will revel in this. Can't comment on translation but must assume it is well done to get publshed in such a handsome edition. One note of caution, many of the images allude to encounters with other men of all ranks and classes. Nevertheless,I got a very vivid picture of Alexandria both current (early 1900's) and ancient.It has a place of honor next to my edition of Robert Graves.
Gregory K. Tobkes
East Meadow, NY
[...]
- Posted on 2009-08-02
A feast of poetry
This is a feast of a book.
Thirty years ago I acquired the translation by Keeley & Sherrard, who were friends of the great Cavafy scholar George Seferis . . . at that time, Cavafy was one of those forbidden pleasures like the PARIS AND NEW YORK DIARIES OF NED ROREM, and OUR LADY OF FLOWERS by Jean Genet that were available in serious LA and New York bookshops of the period.
I was bored by Rorem and Gide, but there were a few great Cavafy poems, it seemed to me at the time, for example "Waiting for the Barbarians", that set apart this late 19th century-early 20th century Greek speaking poet who lived in Alexandria, Egypt from the other merely transgressive, but certainly not transcendent, purveyors of illicit literary pleasures.
I almost didn't bother to pick up the Mendelsohn translation when I saw it in a Sydney bookstore this week, because in my mind I had long ago pigeon-holed Cavafy as a second tier poet of historically subtle poems and of ardent, but somewhat tiresome, gay eroticism.
I am so glad that I bought this book. Reading Cavafy in Mendelsohn's translation is a revelation, a rebirth of a splendid poetic sensibility, and also one of the sure signs of the maturity and stature of American culture in the 21st century, for Mendelsohn is an American. This edition is not simply an accidental conjunction between the poet and a scholar who happened to have a relationship with figures close to Cavafy, it is the union of two complementary and deeply sympathetic spirits, that of Cavafy himself and Mendelsohn. We seem to be emerging from a generation-long desert of American cultural mediocrity imposed upon us by the spiritual tyranny of Theory.
Everything about this edition is first class and saturated in learning and great artistic insight. The scholarly apparatus is extensive but non-intrusive and always edifying. Mendelsohn seems to be that rare scholar who is generous in spirit, repeatedly referring in the text by name to colleagues who have made contributions he considers significant to understanding Cavafy--rather than relegating them to footnotes. The way he has chosen to organise the poems, with characteristic thoughtfulness and sympathy, is far superior to the order in Keeley & Sherrard.
I have found it a deeply moving experience to read Cavafy's poetry in this edition. Please note this review doesn't contain even a hint of the wonders of the poetry itself: I want to preserve that as a pristine pleasure for anyone who choses to read Cavafy in this edition
- Posted on 2009-07-14
Excellent edition.
This volume is a real pleasure to read. Start with the introduction to get grounded; then read the poems; then skim through the extensive notes on the poems in the back of the book; then return to the poems you really liked to reread them AND the notes that go with them. Getting to know Cavafy is well worth the time.
I did not find the second volume satisfying, however. The unfinished poems were not up to the ones in the main volume. I'd skip it.
- Posted on 2009-04-28
Greek-Egyptian Delight
The two books, the second containing unpublished material, are beautiful.
For anyone who appreciates things Egyptian, Greek, poetic, as well as homoerotic, these two books are a wonderful addition to a personal library as well as a source of constant delight, and particularly the translation done by Mendelsohn. i congratlate him and any others involved with the publication.
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