Customer Reviews

Selected Poems (Penguin Classics)

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Quainton & Vinestock have produced an extremely helpful edition of Ronsard. From his hundreds and hundreds of poems, they excerpt 85, presenting French text complete with running English translation and relatively complete endnotes. Moreoever, their edition includes a long, robust introduction and a helpful appendix on metre. This book is, in my view, a model of the way in which Romance literature ought to be presented for Anglos. Indeed, the production and design of the volume reminds one almost more of one of the newer Loebs or of the I Tatti Renaissance Library!

French poet, Pierre de Ronsard (1524-1585), observed that "it is through the Senses that the soul sees, that it hears and that it imagines" (p. 47; 38(L); "Le Premiere Livre des Sonnets pour Helene". Ronsard wrote revolutionary love poetry known for its powerful imagery (drawn from ancient mythology) and sublime sensuality. His influences are evident in the later, twentieth-century work of Yeats, Sylvia Plath, and Henri Matisse.

The 85 selected poems in this outstanding edition of Ronsard are presented to the reader in a French-English format, together with an informative Introduction by editors Quainton and Vinestock, a Chronology of Ronsard's life and work, and impressive Endnotes. The verse in this collection will appeal to anyone who enjoys memorable love poetry.

G. Merritt