Customer Reviews

World Poetry: An Anthology of Verse from Antiquity to Our Time

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

To my knowledge there is not other book like this one in print. It's a 1300+ page book that contains poems from all over the world from ancient Sumeria to the present. You will find poetry from the Bronze age; odes from the Ottoman empire; Latin American and Native American verses, and more from just about every country that has ever produced a poet. There is religious poetry from India and Asia, translations from Sanskrit and from medieval Russian. Vietnamese, Icelandic and Finnish poets are all represented.

The book is bulky yet with a scope so immensely broad it still has to be a sampler. Major English poets like Alexander Pope end up with half a page while, strangely, Victor Hugo gets three-and-a-half pages.

This is a book not just for those who love poetry, but for those who want a taste of history and culture. It's fascinating to go through these old texts and get a glimmer of the interests and feelings of people in different lands at different times throughout history.

Now for the clinkers. A work like this requires a large number of translators, and some of them have been a little too free in their conversions to English.

A poem of Martial (40-104AD) reads thusly: "Ted's studio burnt down, with all his poems./ Have the muses hung their heads?/ You, bet, for it was criminal neglect/ not also to have sautéed Ted."

Hipponax (around 540BC) supposedly said, "Big Daddy/ no scrumptious feast of partridge and hare/ no sesame pancakes/ no fritters drenched/ in honey."

And that most frequently translated of all classical poets Horace (65 -8BC) is accused of coming up with the lines "Dazzled though he be, poor dope, by the golden looks/ Your locks fetched up out of a bottle of Clairol.."

Fun is fun, but I want a serious book of trustworthy translations when I buy an expensive anthology like this. Still, it is a remarkable book, and one of the most important additions to my library.

I have bought several copies of this book to give to people who mean something to me. When I share a poem from this work I am often questioned about "where did you find that"? The range is enormous and the selection of latin poetry in particular is just great. (Even the translation versions are selected carefully) The authors had a great sense of passion, humor and sensuality in their selections. I don't care if someone else thinks their favorite poem is missing...If I had just one book of poetry to keep this would be it.

This is the best,most readable,comprehensive anthology of its type I have discovered. The selections are great with fine translations.The single column typography is very appealing.It is a hefty tome,over 1300 pages,so that I need a lecturn at times.The entries are chronological so that Chinese Poetry is in various periods rather than being all together.I wish I could read these poems in the original languages,but since I cannot,this volume will do nicely.Savor the poems, give a copy to a sensitive,dear friend.Well worth the price,new or used.

A startlingly accomplished book for readers who care for poetry; more, it may induce a previously unsuspected love of poetry for those willing to browse its pages. I got lost in the world it creates. The extent of the editors' encyclopedic familiarity with the universal range of poetic accomplishment is not a small miracle; sensitivity to the quality of each individual translation is equally miraculous. World Poetry" is rarely equalled in breadth and beauty of execution and design, and goes far beyond what Mark van Doren may have wished to create when he edited his "World Treasury..." 70 years ago. Bruce Whitham (baw@mci2000.com) New York

This is an astonishing volume packed with beautiful poems. I honestly cannot think of a better gift for poetry lovers (or, indeed, plain lovers or anyone else...). Akkadian poetry, Nazim Hikmet, Tagore.... almost every single poet that I love is here. How did the editors manage do it???

Putting together an anthology of poetry written in English is all fineand good.... An anthology of world poetry, on the other hand, is a monumental task. ....

Washburn and Major have put together one of the best anthologies I have found. Yes, the book is big...and yet we all find that one favorite poem that wasn't included. Objectively speaking, the breadth is admirable, the translations consistantly excellent, and the organization logical. A person only needs one anthology of world poetry, and this is the best one I know of. END

If I had to flee once more (this is my second exile since I left Bosnia in 1991), I would take this book with me, even though it's heavy and I seriously miss some poets and poems the editors "forgot". It is so vast you can lose yourself in it and come back only after a long while, it is like a glass or two of the best wine in the world..but enough. Buy it, read it, make yourself happy!

I absolutely love this book. An anthology of diverse poetry that would be hard to find anywhere else.
The only think I dislike is the way the book is organized.

Wow! is all can say about this book. What the poems show is that even after 5000 years, our passion for romance, our feelings about one another has never changed. If anything, this anthology shows the emotional and spiritual evolution of mankind in a direct and personal way. When I get down on the human race, I read this book and the poems give me hope again. Because the volume is so big, I always find something new.

The breadth of this anthology is amazing. I pull it off the shelf and browse through it at least a few times each week.