Poet in New York: A Bilingual Edition [Paperback]

Federico García Lorca (Author), Greg Simon (Translator), Steven F. White (Translator)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 24, 1998

Written while Federico García Lorca was a student at Columbia University in 1929-30, Poet in New York is one of the most important books Lorca produced, and certainly one of the most important books ever published about New York City. Indeed, it is a book that changed the direction of poetry in both Spain and the Americas, a pathbreaking and defining work of modern literature.

In honor of the poet's centenary, the celebrated Lorca scholar Christopher Maurer has revised this strange, timeless, and vital book of verse, using much previously unavailable or untranslated material: Lorca's own manuscript of the entire book; witty and insightful letters from the poet to his family describing his feelings about America and his temporary home there (a dorm room in Columbia's John Jay Hall); the annotated photographs which accompany those letters; and a prose poem missing from previous editions. Complementing these new addtions are extensive notes and letters, revised versions of all the poems, and an interpretive lectures by Lorca himself.

An excellent introduction to the work of one of the key figures of modern poetry, this bilingual edition of Poet in New York is also a thrilling exposition of the American city in the 20th century.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Garcia Lorca's long out-of-print poetic sequence about New York City, newly translated in this bilingual edition, is as contemporary as today's headlines: slums, racism, violence and cries of loneliness punctuate this verse. Written during the Spanish playwright's nine-month stopover in 1929-30, and steeped in surrealistic technique, his unrelentingly negative antihymn reads the urban condition as symbolic of our culture's materialistic corruption of love and its degradation of nature. Yet one can question the current validity of Garcia Lorca's howl of protest. In vocalizing the stifled rage of Harlem, he implicitly views blacks as somehow more "natural" than whites. Conflicted about his own homosexuality, he elevates Whitmanesque love between "camerados" over what he sees as a decadent gay subculture. This effective if somewhat flat translation is accompanied by Garcia Lorca's letters and a lecture he delivered on this lyrical work.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

The hermetic symbolism and turbulent images surrealistically convey Lorca's nightmarish impressions of Depression-era New York. This new version, more readable, accurate, and literal than prior translationsincluding Ben Belitt's (Grove, 1983), the only other integral bilingual edition availableand enhanced by addenda such as the editor's scholarly notes on the publishing history of the work, may establish the standard against which all future editions will be measured. An auspicious beginning to a planned three-volume series of Lorca's poetical works. Essential. Lawrence Olszewski, OCLC, Dublin, Ohio
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux; Bilingual edition (June 24, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374525404
• ISBN-13: 978-0374525408
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #301,127 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the most complex and rich books of Lorca, January 1, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Poet in New York (Poetical Works of Federico Garcia Lorca) (Paperback)

Federico García Lorca is among the most celebrated Spanish poets of all time. The beauty of his writing has given him a place in the gallery of the best Spanish writers. This book he wrote when he was a student at Columbia University relies on the influence he got from the surrealistic movements that were running on Europe at the time. Thus, it gets far from the poetic language used in his other books, most notably in Romancero Gitano: verses leave the regularity of the romance to explore new and rich arrangements; the metaphors grow more complex and ellaborate, making a delicious challenge to the reader; one can read a poem time and again for days and will still be unsure of its real meaning. Besides this some of the poems reach a new height on Lorca's poetry. To anybody just seeking to discover Lorca and his world, Romancero Gitano seems to be a best approach in my oppinion, but if you know it and like it, I can't help recommending Poet in New York as a new horizon to discover. If your approach to this book is open-minded, you won't be disappointed.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars powerful and chilling account...., November 26, 2004

By 

D. Pawl "Dani" (Seattle) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Poet in New York: A Bilingual Edition (Paperback)

After reading "A Poet in New York," I can say this much:
"I don't think I am planning a trip to New York very soon." Lorca's account of the city was so visceral, raw and cruel, I could feel the hauntingly dead interactions between people, and those people's relationships to the material world around them. The accounts of violence in the streets are equally as cold and boldly unapologetic as his observations of the early morning hours when the city is first waking up.

Gabriel Garcia Lorca truly shows that when it comes to the movements as a city with ties to industry, capitalistic gain and material wealth, there is no division between the life of the human being and the life of the machine. There is almost an automated, "conveyor belt" feeling to the mechanical movement of life in the city. As soon as energy is poured into an endeavor, it is also poured out just as easily. People are as disposable as sheet metal. Their blood, their organs and their instruments of movement could be ripped away and demolished as quickly and non-emotionally as one would destroy the framework of a building and it would be of no concern to anyone else.

I believe that Lorca's observations and journal entries are a reflection of not only the mindset of one of the most well known cities in the world, applicable to the 1930s, but is also quite accurately a reflection of the state of the world today.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Translators too desperate to make Lorca comprehensible, June 21, 2009

By 

Nicholas (NYC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Poet in New York: A Bilingual Edition (Paperback)

Fredrico Garcia Lorca did no wrong with Poet in New York, it is the translators who do him wrong in this edition. Desperate to make Lorca's abstract and haunting images accessible, Simon and White lose the poetic element in Lorca's writing. Not to mention the translation is not even literal. (i.e. "Carne" is translated "skin" instead of "flesh," or "meat." "Asesinado" is translated "cut down" instead of "murdered.") So what we end up with is a vain attempt to make Lorca more easily understood--a task which insults the intelligence of the reader and the creativity of the poet--which in turn results in a loose translation that reads too much like prose with line breaks. If you are looking to buy Poet in New York, do yourself a favor and buy the Medina and Statman translation. It is much truer to the spirit of the original, as well as the language.