Poetry > E Poetry

Advantages: A breezy format; excellent discussion of translation; cheap price; highly provocative
Disadvantages: None

...(Paz’s own entry). Numbered in nineteen sections, the first three are devoted explicitly to the original: 1) Wang Wei’s text in Chinese characters, 2) its transliteration using the Pinyin system of rendering Chinese sounds with our alphabet, and 3) a word-for-word gloss of each character, including numerous potential translations. Weinberger provides excellent commentary on all nineteen sections, and Paz adds a little essay at the end. While ostensibly ...
...it can be transmuted, and in some cases, utterly ruined through translation, the authors’ text can easily serve as a mini-course on the vicissitudes of translation in general. The universal applicability of their conclusions to any notion of poetic translation is an added bonus to what is first and foremost a guide to the challenges and demands of translating classical Chinese poetry. The book tells as much about "bad" translation practices as it ... Read review

Advantages: Unconventional, interesting, a rare voice even today
Disadvantages: A bit elementary at times

------------------------------------------ anyone lived in a pretty how town with up so floating many bells down ------------------------------------------ The poetry of ee cummings is something that most Americans gain exposure to during secondary school (and occasionally in the education of those outside America) -- he is often seen as an acceptable example of one who broke the rules -- rules, the teacher will often hasten to add, which must ...
...this is not what ee cummings would hope had come of his legacy. In reading his poetry in this edition, his prose, his theatrical writings, and his unpublished manuscripts (some of which have been published under the title Etc.), a new vision begins to emerge of a real maverick--not someone who wanted to break the rules, but someone who eschewed the idea of rules so completely that breaking them was beyond the question, for that would have to recognise ... Read review

Advantages: strange, intruiging and startling.
Disadvantages: hard to make sense of

I first read e.e.cummings about three years ago and have never really got over him. An amazing innovative poet with the power to transofrm words and reveal meanings. Famous for using punctuation and capitalisation in strange ways, cummings has the ability to revitalise frequently used language and turn it into something new and ecxiting. For example: "anyone lived in a pretty how town (with up so floating many bells down) spring summer autumn ...
...In this poem, anyone and someone could in fact be individual people, or they could rpresent a wole group. Words like "How" are employed peculiarly as adjectives. What, after all is a "pretty how Town"? e.e.cummings is not easy reading. His poetry is hard to make sense of, and often its not even about sense, its about sound, rhythm and impression. There are quite often meanings that can be found, but to some extent they will be things that you bring ... Read review

Advantages: A fine poet who ... manages to build the richest of poems from the barest of methods
Disadvantages: May be boring for younger readers.

All of her poems definately have an emotional attachment in some way to something whthin both the readed and probably Jennings herself. I have studied some of her poems and i find them very interesting to read, they convey something of a deeper meaning. My Grandmother She kept an antique shop – or it kept her.... And I remember how I once refused To go out with her, since I was afraid. It was perhaps a wish not to be used Like antique objects. ...
...I felt no grief at all, ...guilt of what I once refused. ...walked into her room things she never used But needed... This poem in particular makes you reflect on how you treat others, also that every day should be made the most of - nothing lasts for ever. From reading this poem in particular i have tried to pay more attention to other people, in particular, my Gran, old people can often seem "in the way" their old fashioned ways can become ... Read review

Advantages: historical insight into Victorian life, particularly as a woman, enjoyable
Disadvantages: quite lengthy at 11,000 lines

...literature will surely be rewarded. Aurora Leigh is the life story of one highly intelligent woman living during the Victorian period who feels held back by the patriarchal society which dictates that women have neither the intellectual capacity for writing poetry, nor the social position needed to become a successful poet. The subject of the book is therefore the subjugation of women to the dominating male. Aurora Leigh is a young poet who lives ...
...The main action in Aurora Leigh commences when Romney Leigh, Aurora's cousin, asks Aurora to marry him. Romney is a social activist and shares the common view of society that women can not, and should not write poetry. Despite Aurora's contrary opinion to this, Romney attempts to persuade Aurora to join his cause. She of course rejects her suitor, although by the end of the ninth book, they have become united. What is most important however, is ... Read review