A Greek Quintet: Poems by Cavafy, Sikelianos, Seferis, Elytis And Gatsos

Denise Harvey, 2000-07-01. 2nd. Paperback. Very Good. 7x5x0. Minor shelf wear, binding tight, pages clean and unmarked. During this century the Greek world has produced a wealth of poetry that is as astonishing in its scope as it is in its vigour; and this anthology brings together a selection from the works of the five poets who may be said to take pride of place in substantiating this achievement. Two of them (George Seferis. and Odysseus Elytis) are Nobel Laureates, Cavafy is certainly one of the most ubiquitous poets of our times, the oracular grandeur of Angelos Sikelianos compan-ions him with W. B. Yeats, while Nikos Gatsos, less known outside Greece, is a fine lyrical poet and song writer. The poems in this selection are for the most part taken from the translators' more ample volumes of translations of Greek poetry, namely, their George Seferis: Collected Poems, of which Peter Levi wrote, 'I doubt if we shall ever see transla-tions as wonderfully full of Seferis as these'; their C. P. Cavafy: Collected Poems, described by Stephen Spender as 'a prayer fulfilled'; their Angelos Sikelianos: Selected Poems and their Odysseus Elytis: Selected Poems. They have been chosen as those that translate most successfully into English and at the same time are representative of the best work of the original poets. `The arrival of Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard on the modern Greek translation scene marks quite a definite and definative stage of a process; the excellence of their work is really worthy of recognition . . .' Lawrence Durrell, The New York Times Book Review. `Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard have done more than anyone else to awaken [English-speaking] readers to the riches of contemporary Greek poetry . . . I can think of no better introduction to Greek poetry.' Emily Grosholz, The Hudson Review. Edmund Keeley, Professor of English and Director of Creative Writing at Princeton University, has also published several novels as well as a study on Cavafy, Cavafy's Alexandria, and translations of poems by Yannis Ritsos, Repetitions, Testimonies, Parentheses. Philip Sherrard has taught at the universities of Oxford and London and is the author of several other works on Byzantine and modern Greek themes, including The Marble Threshing Floor: Studies in Modern Greek Poetry and The Wound of Greece: Studies in Neo-Hellenism.