To Urania: Poems

By Joseph Brodsky

Book Overview

Combining two books of verse that were first published in his native Russian, "To Urania" was Brodsky's third volume to appear in English. Published in 1988, the year after he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, this collection features pieces translated by the poet himself and others, as well as poems written originally in English. Auden once characterized Brodsky as "a traditionalist . . . interested in what lyric poets of all ages have been interested in . . . encounters with nature . . . reflections upon the human condition, death, and the meaning of existence." Reading the poems in "To Urania"--by turns cerebral, caustic, comic, and celebratory--we appreciate firsthand a great lyric poet's variety and achievement.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0374172536
• ISBN13: 9780374172534
• Release Date: September 1988
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
• Length: 184 Pages
• Weight: 1.20 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.2" x 0.9" x 6.2"

Customer Reviews

A treasure

I came to Joseph Brodsky after reading a selection of his poems in Yevtushenko's anthology, 20th Century Russian Poetry. To Urania is Brodsky's book of poems I treasure most. These are poems of memory and longing - an illustration of how places and people leave imprints and scars in an exile's soul (read mind or body,if you like). Though most poems are translations (including many by Brodsky himself), they manage to convey their meaning in the most concrete terms. Above all, the poems are a record of how adversity can never extinguish hope.