What do you think?
Rate this book
The Poet’s Work: An Introduction to Czeslaw Milosz
Born eighty years ago in Lithuania, Czeslaw Milosz has been acclaimed “one of the greatest poets of our time, perhaps the greatest” (Joseph Brodsky). This self-described “connoisseur of heavens and abysses” has produced a corpus of poems, essays, memoirs, and fiction of such depth and range that the reader's imagination is moved far beyond ordinary limits of consciousness. In The Poet's Work Leonard Nathan and Arthur Quinn follow Milosz's wanderings in exile from Poland to Paris to Berkeley as they chart the singular development of his art. Relating his life and his works to the unfolding of his thought, they have crafted a lucid reading of Milosz that far surpasses anything yet written on this often enigmatic poet.
The Poet's Work is not only a solid introduction to Milosz; it is also a unique record of the poet's own interpretations of his work. As colleagues of Milosz at Berkeley, Nathan and Quinn had long, detailed discussions with the poet. It is this spirit of collaboration that brings a sense of immediacy and authority to their seamless study. Nathan and Quinn reveal as never before why Milosz is a true visionary, a poet of ideas in history. And they show how the influence of Blake, Simone Weil, Dostoevsky, Lev Shestov, and Swedenborg, together with Henry Miller, Allen Ginsberg, and Robinson Jeffers, has enriched his vision. Milosz's lifelong experience of totalitarian regimes that exalt science and technology over individual needs and aspirations, his acute sense of alienation as an émigré, and his humanistic zeal and belief in the primacy of living have brought a prismatic quality to his poetry.
At seventy, Milosz spoke of himself as an “ecstatic pessimist.” In their sensitive mapping of his art, Nathan and Quinn skillfully demonstrate that Milosz's global influence has been achieved by the ever-shifting balance he strikes between ecstasy and pessimism. Irony and humor are never far from this book, which not only communicates Milosz's polyphonic message but also evokes his uniquely humane sensibility. The Poet's Work is an illuminating introduction to Milosz that will inform and engage scholars and general readers for years to come.
The Poet's Work is not only a solid introduction to Milosz; it is also a unique record of the poet's own interpretations of his work. As colleagues of Milosz at Berkeley, Nathan and Quinn had long, detailed discussions with the poet. It is this spirit of collaboration that brings a sense of immediacy and authority to their seamless study. Nathan and Quinn reveal as never before why Milosz is a true visionary, a poet of ideas in history. And they show how the influence of Blake, Simone Weil, Dostoevsky, Lev Shestov, and Swedenborg, together with Henry Miller, Allen Ginsberg, and Robinson Jeffers, has enriched his vision. Milosz's lifelong experience of totalitarian regimes that exalt science and technology over individual needs and aspirations, his acute sense of alienation as an émigré, and his humanistic zeal and belief in the primacy of living have brought a prismatic quality to his poetry.
At seventy, Milosz spoke of himself as an “ecstatic pessimist.” In their sensitive mapping of his art, Nathan and Quinn skillfully demonstrate that Milosz's global influence has been achieved by the ever-shifting balance he strikes between ecstasy and pessimism. Irony and humor are never far from this book, which not only communicates Milosz's polyphonic message but also evokes his uniquely humane sensibility. The Poet's Work is an illuminating introduction to Milosz that will inform and engage scholars and general readers for years to come.
176 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1991
22 people want to read
About the author
Leonard Nathan
53 books5 followersLeonard Nathan has published many volumes of poetry, as well as numerous translations, prose works, and articles on poetry.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
March 6, 2020
An observation into life, it's tragedies, it's beauty, it's boringness. These are outlined in Czeslaw Milosz's poetry work. A focus of tragedy, the ambitious society, the seek for money instead of basic life elements is seen among the beautifully composed phrases by Milosz. Nathan did a great job by citing the corresponding works of poetry to show another element of life to show the world about. I recommend this book to someone who knows about poetry and likes to discover new perspectives of the world through poetry. This quote summarises the theme of the book's insight into Milosz's work: "We leave the poem with a sense that pathos permeates all of our brief joys in the blind moments between the vast grindings of impersonal cause and effect."
September 1, 2024
There were whole pages in this book that were somehow less clear than the most obtuse of Milosz’s
poems, yet still, by the end, I had a much clearer understanding of the scope of Milosz’s thought and character of his poetics. The sections on his engagement with Dostoevsky and Weil were especially helpful, as well as the penultimate and final chapters detailing his later works, clarifying his position as a poet of ecstatic pessimism—ecstatic amazement at the fact of existence and the beauty of its particularity, and pessimism at the way those particular seem to pale against the looming backdrop of grinding history and greedy nature. Still, to speak is an act of hope, and speak Milosz did, all the way to the end.
poems, yet still, by the end, I had a much clearer understanding of the scope of Milosz’s thought and character of his poetics. The sections on his engagement with Dostoevsky and Weil were especially helpful, as well as the penultimate and final chapters detailing his later works, clarifying his position as a poet of ecstatic pessimism—ecstatic amazement at the fact of existence and the beauty of its particularity, and pessimism at the way those particular seem to pale against the looming backdrop of grinding history and greedy nature. Still, to speak is an act of hope, and speak Milosz did, all the way to the end.
January 15, 2020
I read this book as part of a reading/discussion with my dear brother. I was familiar with Milosz’s poetry (the book had been gifted by my brother back in the 80s), but this study creates a detailed, biographical context for understanding his writing. It helps to be versed in the academic discourse surrounding notions of humanism, as well as to be tolerant of a search for truth that involves accepting contradictions between such things as rationalism and faith.
July 22, 2017
A new, humorless generation is now arising,
It takes in deadly earnest all we received with laughter.
It's upsetting how poems written in occupied Poland can fit so easily in the Trump age.
It takes in deadly earnest all we received with laughter.
It's upsetting how poems written in occupied Poland can fit so easily in the Trump age.
May 6, 2012
actually reading Selected Poems, Czeslaw Milosz 1931-2004 - 262 pages
July 22, 2012
An amazing poet and thinker
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews