Prose
Yves Bonnefoy author Anthony Rudolf editor Stephen Romer editor John Naughton editor
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Carcanet Press Ltd
Published:30th Apr '20
Should be back in stock very soon

Yves Bonnefoy (1923-2016), a major poet, was equally a seminal essayist and thinker. This companion volume to Yves Bonnefoy: Poems contains what he regarded as his foundational essays, as well as a generous selection from all periods. In his art criticism, as in his literary essays, Bonnefoy manages that rare thing: to impart metaphysical urgency to each discreet encounter with a painting or a poem, born of his constant quest for intensity, for 'presence'. Whether he is examining an early Byzantine fresco, a Shakespeare play, a Bernini angel, a drawing by Blake, a poem by Rimbaud, the exigency, the high seriousness and the challenge is the same: to affirm presence, and finitude, against all forms of life-sapping conceptual thought. If they cannot always deliver ecstasy or hope, the great poets, argues Bonnefoy, are pledged to 'intensity as such', sustained by 'une mélancolie ardente'.
'Expertly and economically edited... an indispensible read' Fiona Sampson, The Guardian
'What Bonnefoy has to say is consistently exciting... This is a book to challenge lazy ideas about the purpose(s) and nature of poetry and to open its readers' eyes and minds... I cannot recommend the book too highly' Glyn Pursglove, Acumen Magazine
ISBN: 9781784108113
Dimensions: 216mm x 135mm x 34mm
Weight: unknown
456 pages