Conatus

by Walter Hildebrandt

While reading Leonardo Padura’s novel “Heretics” Hildbrandt became fascinated by the tolerance that exited in Havana Cuba, and Amsterdam in the Netherlands. These two cities became havens and harbours for Sephardic Jews initially driven out of the Middle East by Romans, then persecuted in Spain and Portugal by the Inquisitions of the Catholic Church. Hildebrandt uses a wide variety of people and characters to bring us to a greater understanding of the two remarkable cities. These include Rembrandt, Spinoza, and the powerful, thought-provoking and engaging. Like his other poems, Hildebrandt draws on an array of disciplines and formed, including history, culture, philosophy, fiction and diverse lyric and narrative poetics. In these trouble, increasingly intolerant times, “Conatus” is an important read.

79 pages, Paperback

First published January 2, 2020