The Dream of the Poem: Hebrew Poetry from Muslim and Christian Spain, 950-1492

306372384

The Dream of the Poem: Hebrew Poetry from Muslim and Christian Spain, 950-1492 (Lockert Library of Poetry in Translation)
By Peter Cole


  

Publisher:  Princeton University Press
Number Of Pages:  576
Publication Date:  2007-01-02
ISBN-10 / ASIN:  069112194X
ISBN-13 / EAN:  9780691121949


Product Description:

Hebrew culture experienced a renewal in medieval Spain that produced what is arguably the most powerful body of Jewish poetry written since the Bible. Fusing elements of East and West, Arabic and Hebrew, and the particular and the universal, this verse embodies an extraordinary sensuality and intense faith that transcend the limits of language, place, and time.

Peter Cole's translations reveal this remarkable poetic world to English readers in all of its richness, humor, grace, gravity, and wisdom. The Dream of the Poem traces the arc of the entire period, presenting some four hundred poems by fifty-four poets, and including a panoramic historical introduction, short biographies of each poet, and extensive notes. (The original Hebrew texts are available on the Princeton University Press Web site.) By far the most potent and comprehensive gathering of medieval Hebrew poems ever assembled in English, Cole's anthology builds on what poet and translator Richard Howard has described as \"the finest labor of poetic translation that I have seen in many years\" and \"an entire revelation: a body of lyric and didactic verse so intense, so intelligent, and so vivid that it appears to identify a whole dimension of historical consciousness previously unavailable to us.\" The Dream of the Poem is, Howard says, \"a crowning achievement.\"




Summary: Important for Generations to Come
Rating: 5

There are really no other relevant words for the poems included in this book than \"radiant.\" Peter Cole has given the poetry reading world a rare gift that combines scholarship with aesthetic sensibility, not to mention allowing us to rediscover a moment of supreme artistic triumph. From poems of agonized religious yearning to homoerotic complaint, the modern reader is necessarily struck by how modern and, paradoxically, how distant these works are. Besides, since there is no other translation that even aspires to the breadth and scope of this one, it's a no-brainer. If you love poetry then you have to read it. And if you read it you'll want to own it for yourself.



Summary: wonderful history - beautiful poetry - stunning scholarship
Rating: 5

Cole's outstanding book spans more than five centuries of Iberian Hebrew poetry from over 50 poets. It is an amazing work of scholarship and literary finesse: 300 pages of text supplemented with almost 200 pages of notes. But enough with the statistics.

Until their final expulsion in 1492, Jews remained an important minority community in Spain (and neighboring Provence) under both Muslim and Christian rule. The flowering of culture under \"La Convivencia\" has been well documented, but The Dream of the Poem stands out in its historical scope, beautiful translations, and focus on the Jewish community.

Each poet is introduced in a one-to-two page biography followed by a selection of works, sometimes only one or two poems, but many pages for the major figures. To read the biographies alone gives a clear sense of the development of the Jewish community over the years, as it moved from close proximity to power under the Muslims to increasing alienation and ultimately expulsion under the Christians.

But then to read Cole's translations of the poems... It's all here, from divine praise to homoeroticism, from bitter rivalries among poets to a growing sense of betrayal and dread in the last century before the expulsion. As you read, remember that many of these poets were writing Hebrew in Arabic script using Arabic forms and themes in addition to their own.

If you want to be carried off to a distant time and place - or you just want to read some wonderful poetry - this one is hard to beat.



Summary: a jewel of the middle ages
Rating: 5

this collection is fantastico..supreme and sublime..powerful poetics in/of Jews in exile..makes modern poetry seem like drivel..rare high quality translation..excellent work/art...you dont read this, you soak in it..



Summary: Sound information with good poetic translation
Rating: 5

The book includes a very informative and well annotated Introduction, covering the historical, social, and poetic context of Hebrew poetry in medieval Spain. Each selection of poems, besides, is preceded by the author's biography, with specific information and critical evaluation of his work.
The selection of poets, itself, deserves to be praised, because it encompasses a very large period of time in medieval Iberia, and includes poets that are not easy to find translated elsewhere in the bibliography.
Being the work of a poet himself, the translation of the poems makes them sound like poetry, and not like a mere paraphrasis of the content.



Summary: The Dream of the Poem Fulfilled
Rating: 5

Peter Cole has provided the literary world with an astonishing service;he has managed to recuperate an entire poetic tradition and securely place it within the crown of the greatest achievements of the Western canon prior to Shakespeare. It is humbling to read these poems, many of which were almost lost forever, some of which were not discovered until the 20th century. They are arguably the finest poems written in Hebrew since the Bible and, unlike medieval and Renaissance poetry in English, Cole's remarkable translations allow them to be read fluently with a diction and tone that is uncannily modern. References to religious and cultural borrowings, from the Arabic tradition, from the Torah and from the Psalms, as well as the manner of choosing a particular word, are clearly explained in more than 200 pages of Notes, and do not in any way impede the pleasure of the general reader. Many of the poems feel strictly contemporaneous. Here is \"The Apple\", an ekphrastic poem by Shmu'el Hanagid (993-1056):

I
I, when you notice,
am cast in gold:
the bite of the ignorant
frightens me.

II
An apple filled with spices:
silver coated with gold.
And others that grow in the orchard
beside it, bright as rubies.

I asked it: Why aren't you like those?
Soft, with your skin exposed?
And it answered in silence: Because
boors and fools have jaws.

Cole's careful attention to half-rhymes and his skill in metrical pacing are evident throughout. Secular poems on many subjects, from the joys of wine and sangria to sexual passion and romantic ambivalence are given the same loving attention as those that are more obviously devotional and pietistic. Cole's general introduction to the volume is exemplary in laying out the method of translation and his rationale for it. In addition to generous selections from the four giants of the period (Hanagid, Shelomo Ibn Gabirol, Moshe Ibn Ezra, and Yehuda HaLevi), many poets here receive their first exposure in English. Among the many felicities of this volume are the brief and touching biographies devoted to each poet as the heading to his selection of work. This is one of the finest examples of the art of poetic translation in modern times; an abridged bilingual edition of just the major poems would be a further gift.

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