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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
An impressive multicultural anthology, June 27, 2001
This review is from: Voices : Poetry and Art from Around the World (Hardcover)
"Voices: Poetry and Art from Around the World," selected by Barbara Brenner, is an anthology of literature and visual art from many cultures. The book is divided up into 6 sections: North America, South America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia/Oceania. Some of the texts included are an Inuit chant, a traditional Navajo song, a Quechua lament, a Chinese nursery rhyme, and a Scottish ballad. Specific authors whose poetry is represented include Langston Hughes, Gertrude Stein, Victor Hernandez Cruz, Federico Garcia Lorca, and Dennis Brutus. The full-color visual art includes paintings, sculptures, ceramic figurines, and various folk crafts: a Mande hunter's shirt from West Africa, a Turkish rug, etc. Other pieces of art pictured include a Sumerian sculpture dated between 2750 and 2600 BCE, and Pablo Picasso's 1921 painting "Three Musicians." This is a truly remarkable collection, and makes a great multicultural educational resource.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Faraway becomes Familiar, February 6, 2003
This review is from: Voices : Poetry and Art from Around the World (Hardcover)
"I was overwhelmed by the power, beauty, and variety of what I found." -Barbara Brenner when working on this book.
This book presents poetry and art from six continents:
North America: Voices from glaciers, city streets, green valleys...
South America: Voices from cloud forest, jungle, deserts
Europe: Voices from heath and moor, fjords, sun-kissed fields of flowers
Africa: Voices from vast deserts, great rivers, rugged hills and endless skies
Asia: Voices from ragged mountains, wave-splashed coasts, cherry-blossomed gardens
Australia/Oceania: Voices from the outback, rocks, coral reefs, strings of islands...
These poems celebrate paintings, fold art, historical artifacts and photographs that each evoke the flavor of each continent. This is a book about the human family and how each culture speaks to us all in the universal language of art and poetry.
I especially loved "The Pen"
"Take a pen in your uncertain fingers.
Trust, and be assured
That the whole world is a sky-blue butterfly
And words are the nets to capture it."
You will also find a portion of the Epic of Gilgamesh, Lyrics from Ancient Arabia and a Chinese Nursery Rhyme. I wish I was a child again and could sit around in a tree house reading poetry. The art was as fascinating as the poems.
~The Rebecca Review
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Interesting cultural exploration and collection of world poetry, March 16, 2011
This review is from: Voices : Poetry and Art from Around the World (Hardcover)
Very interesting collection of world poetry, from all corners of the globe. The artwork and artifacts add interest to this anthology. It truly is a cultural and historical exploration. I especially enjoyed the section on Ireland and China. There is a nice section of Asia which includes China, Japan, a couple of poems from Bangladesh, Pakistan, Indonesia and Malaysia. Nothing, though, from India.
South America is fully explored, Native American and American poetry. It is a very lovely book, interesting. The only criticism is that each opening Chapter contains a large spread photograph, instead of art like the rest of the book, panaromic in most cases, of the continent represented in the chapter. It doesn't flow, it is very National Geographic, as this book is a National Geographic book, while the rest of the book is poetry and art. The only photo that works is the Cambodian photo, which is not panoramic, but artsy, with a close up of a temple, with bright-orange clad monks.
In any case, I'm putting this one on my wishlist, it is well worth it, and it can help a teen to widen his or her horizons as well, get a view of the world and some insight into cultural and world history, as well as a view of some interesting art. Some of the art is just wallpaper, you could say, some is musuem-like displays, other is true art of interest from various cultures.
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