Osip Mandelstam: 50 Poems [Paperback]

Osip Mandelshtam (Author), Bernard Meares (Translator), Joseph Brodsky (Introduction)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 2000

"One can hear Mandelstam's real voice in these translations. The nervous pure voice of his love, his memory, his culture, and his faith, waverable as a candle in the wind."—from the introduction by Joseph Brodsky

All of the poems of this great Russian poet in acclaimed translations, accompanied by notes, a biographical chronology, a translator's introduction, and a major essay by Nobel Prize-winner Joseph Brodsky written specifically for this volume.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Again The Discordances Of War
The Age
Along With All The Others
Among The Priests And Elders, The Young Levite
The Apartment's As Quiet As Paper
Ariosto
At A Terrifying Height, A Wandering Fire
Because I Didn't Dare Hold Off Your Embraces
The Breaches Of Round Bays, The Gravel And The Blue
The Bread Is Poisoned And The Air's Drunk Dry
A Certain Alexander Herzovich
A Cold Spring In Starving Old Crimea
The Day Was Five-headed. For Five Days And Five Nights
The Finder Of A Horseshoe
For The Resounding Valor Of Millenia To Come
From Ottave
Hagia Sophia
Heaviness And Tenderness, You're Sisters With The Same Device
I Drink To Military Asters, To All That I'm Censured About
I Washed In The Courtyard At Night
I'll Say It In Draft In A Whisper
I'll Tell You Bluntly
The Idle Life Has Sent Us Insane
In A Sledge Packed Deep In Straw We Lurched
In Petersburg We'll Meet Again
In The Polyphony Of Young Girls' Choirs
Insomnia. Homer. Tautly Swelling Sails
Leningrad
Like Summer Lightning A Life Fell Away
My Eyelashes Sting And A Tear Has Welled Up In My Heart
The Ode On Slate
On Police Station Watermarked Paper
Salome
Still Far From Patriarch Ar Sage
Stooping Involuntarily To The Empty Ground
Take, For Joy's Sake, From These Hands Of Mine
There Are Orioles In The Forests And The Only Real Measure
This Night Is Beyond Repair
To The German Language
Tristia
The Twilight Of Freedom
Verses On The Unknown Soldier
Wave To Wave The Comber Runs, Breaking The Backs Of Waves
We Live Without Feeling Beneath Us Firm Ground
What Is The Name Of This Street?
When Moscow's Feverish Forum Dies
Where Is That Bound And Fettered Groan?
Where Night Casts Anchor
Winter For Some Is Arak Spirit And Blue-eyed Punch
With Them And Not With You Or Me
Toward Biography (9)
-- Table of Poems from Poem Finder®

Language Notes

Text: English, Russian (translation) --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 130 pages
• Publisher: Persea (May 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0892550066
• ISBN-13: 978-0892550067
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.1 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,076,371 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Poet, October 17, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Osip Mandelstam: 50 Poems (Paperback)

Reading these poems will make you understand why Mandelstam is so highly regarded. All 50 are well-translated works of genius. It has the best version of his (suicidal) lampoon of Stalin that I have read in translation. Reading these will make you hungry for more of his work.

20 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars as good as it gets, November 17, 2000

By 

MUHAREM BAZDULJ (TRAVNIK Bosnia and Herzegowina) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Osip Mandelstam: 50 Poems (Paperback)

It should be said right at the beginning: Mandelstam is perhaps the best 20th century poet. Joseph Brodsky maybe share his place, but Brodsky is also co-author of this book - he wrote great preface for it. This anthology of Mandelstam's poems is not perfect only because it is not a collection of his complete works. However, this is a book which contains some of his best poems. Both Mandelstam and Brodsky are great examples of how true are the verses by Marina Tzvetvaeva: "In this most Christian of all worlds/ All poets are Jews." The perfection of this poetry is an evidence of the fact how great poetry once was - not a long time ago. Unfortunately, today the world have very little poets even close to Mandelstam.