View with a Grain of Sand (1997)

Any fault I find with these poems I ascribe to the vagaries of translation. I wish I could read these in the original Polish. Whatever pale echoes these might be, they are yet powerful and true. "This terrifying world is not devoid of charms..." ( )

This collection includes one of my favorite poems, "The Joy of Writing" ( http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1996/poems-5-e.html ) along with 99 other jewels. ( )

I'm not much of a fan of poetry, but I liked many from this collection. Of course, my favorite was the one on writing. ( )

A wonderful collection. ( )

This volume is filled with gems. She addresses a very broad range of themes in these poems --– the folly of reductionism, randomness and contingency in human experience, the propensity to cruelty and injustice and virtually every modern irony you can think of. She uses simple, sure rhythms, and deliciously quirky, smart, playful and ironic imagery. The tone of these poems is consistent, but hard to describe -- passionately detached? Exuberantly ambivalent? Naively sophisticated?

The power of these poems is not so much the novelty of the ideas she expresses, but her ability to make us see and appreciate the wonderful ironies of common experience anew. Perhaps that’s the definition of the poet’s calling.

That these poems are translated from the Polish seems incredible to me. I have no way to judge the faithfulness of the translation to the original Polish, but these poems are absolutely brilliant in English. ( )