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Transparent Body & Other Poems
Translated into English for the first time, the collected poems of Max Blecher—the lone volume of poetry published in his lifetime, Transparent Body, along with verse published in periodicals and posthumously—add important color to Blecher's body of work, most clearly displaying his early surrealist tendencies, as well as illustrating key moments in his prose works, as readers will find allusions and callbacks to his three novels. This volume is bilingual, with the original Romanian on the facing pages.
- GenresPoetry
66 pages, Paperback
Published March 15, 2022
About the author
Max Blecher
19 books142 followersBlecher's father was a successful Jewish merchant and the owner of a porcelain shop. Blecher attended primary and secondary school in Roman, Romania. After receiving his baccalaureat, Blecher left for Paris to study medicine. Shortly thereafter, in 1928, he was diagnosed with spinal tuberculosis (Pott's disease) and forced to abandon his studies. He sought treatment at various sanatoriums: Berck-sur-Mer in France, Leysin in Switzerland and Tekirghiol in Romania.
For the remaining ten years of his life, he was confined to his bed and practically immobilized by the disease. Despite his illness, he wrote and published his first piece in 1930, a short story called "Herrant" in Tudor Arghezi's literary magazine Bilete de papagal. He contributed to André Breton's literary review Le Surréalisme au service de la révolution and carried on an intense correspondence with the foremost writers and philosophers of his day such as André Breton, André Gide, Martin Heidegger, Illarie Voronca, Geo Bogza, Mihail Sebastian, and Saşa Pană.
In 1934 he published Corp transparent, a volume of poetry. In 1935, Blecher's parents moved him to a house on the outskirts of Roman where he continued to write until his death in 1938. During his lifetime he published two other major works, Întâmplări în irealitate imediată (Adventures in Immediate Unreality) and Inimi cicatrizate (Scarred Hearts), as well as a number of short prose pieces, articles and translations. Vizuina luminată: Jurnal de sanatoriu (The Lit Up Burrow: Sanatorium Journal) was published posthumously in part in 1947 and in full in 1971.
For the remaining ten years of his life, he was confined to his bed and practically immobilized by the disease. Despite his illness, he wrote and published his first piece in 1930, a short story called "Herrant" in Tudor Arghezi's literary magazine Bilete de papagal. He contributed to André Breton's literary review Le Surréalisme au service de la révolution and carried on an intense correspondence with the foremost writers and philosophers of his day such as André Breton, André Gide, Martin Heidegger, Illarie Voronca, Geo Bogza, Mihail Sebastian, and Saşa Pană.
In 1934 he published Corp transparent, a volume of poetry. In 1935, Blecher's parents moved him to a house on the outskirts of Roman where he continued to write until his death in 1938. During his lifetime he published two other major works, Întâmplări în irealitate imediată (Adventures in Immediate Unreality) and Inimi cicatrizate (Scarred Hearts), as well as a number of short prose pieces, articles and translations. Vizuina luminată: Jurnal de sanatoriu (The Lit Up Burrow: Sanatorium Journal) was published posthumously in part in 1947 and in full in 1971.
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April 25, 2022
Max Blecher (1909-1938) was a Romanian writer whose brief career was bracketed by a diagnosis of spinal tuberculosis, which largely invalided him the last 10 years of his life. In addition to several novels, he also wrote some poetry, the entirety of which (20) are collected here and translated into English for the first time with facing originals in Romanian.
Given Blecher’s diagnosis and the number of years he suffered, little surprise should be taken in the poems’ bittersweet tone and more in their ability to convey composure as well as they do. Here is the entirety of “Your Hands”:
"Your hands on the piano like two horses
With hooves of marble
Your hands on the vertebrae like two horses
With hooves of roses
Your hands in the blue like two birds
With wings of silk
Your hands on my head
Like two stones on one grave."
Comfort, its opposite, and their balance are issues that run throughout these poems, like the closing couplet from “Love, Moth of Black Ports”:
"Love, meshwork of a world in which the trapped
Dance like reflective and insane clowns."
A nice observation, that clowns (people) come in two flavors—reflective and insane—but at the end of the day, one is still a clown. Even in pain, Blecher doesn’t take himself too seriously. Recommended.
Given Blecher’s diagnosis and the number of years he suffered, little surprise should be taken in the poems’ bittersweet tone and more in their ability to convey composure as well as they do. Here is the entirety of “Your Hands”:
"Your hands on the piano like two horses
With hooves of marble
Your hands on the vertebrae like two horses
With hooves of roses
Your hands in the blue like two birds
With wings of silk
Your hands on my head
Like two stones on one grave."
Comfort, its opposite, and their balance are issues that run throughout these poems, like the closing couplet from “Love, Moth of Black Ports”:
"Love, meshwork of a world in which the trapped
Dance like reflective and insane clowns."
A nice observation, that clowns (people) come in two flavors—reflective and insane—but at the end of the day, one is still a clown. Even in pain, Blecher doesn’t take himself too seriously. Recommended.
Displaying 1 of 1 review