Review by Booklist Review
The last collection that the late Nobel laureate himself prepared for publication shows him wrestling with faith and disbelief, sin and redemption, death and immortality. Two of its five parts contain very religiously concerned sequences. In the poems of part 2, Father Severinus, a priest weighs church history and his own history: Can I tell them: there is no Hell, he asks, when they learn on earth what Hell is? Part 33, in Milosz's own voice, is a Treatise on Theology that eventually acknowledges that, although it is his duty as a poet to not flatter popular imaginings, he still desires to keep faith with Our Lady at Fatima and Lourdes. If the tributary sequence to his great forebear and inspiration, Oscar Milosz (1877-1939), seems more secular, yet at its heart are his uncle's poetic anticipation of Einsteinian relativity, which allows for the initial creative act of God, and comparison of his uncle to the great mystic Emmanuel Swedenborg. One of the short poems of part 1 expresses what is perhaps the most certain conviction in the book, that if there is no God, a man is still not permitted to sadden his brother / By saying that there is no God. This is a great last book. --Ray Olson Copyright 2004 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
The title's second space comprises heaven and hell, which have "vanished forever"; without them the blessed cannot "meet salvation" and the damned "find suitable quarters." In mourning, the poet exhorts: "Let us implore that it be returned to us,/ That second space." The Nobel laureate, who died this past summer in Krak?w at 93, is preoccupied in this collection with establishing that space through words, but also finds it in carnality and in "the unattainable Now." The opening section of summative short lyrics on themes familiar from late Milosz (memory, salvation, place) is followed by four long poems. "Father Severinus" is an eponymous 11-poem dramatic monologue of a priest (who shares one of the names of medieval philosopher Boethius) in whom there is "only a hope of hope." Next comes "Treatise on Theology" ("A young man couldn't write a treatise like this,/ Though I don't think it is dictated by fear of death"), followed by "Apprentice," a beautiful autobiography in verse (with extensive prose annotations by Milosz) and finally a stunning, short "Orpheus and Eurydice": "His lyre was silent and in his dream he was defenseless./ He knew he must have faith and he could not have faith./ And so he would persist, for a very long time,/ Counting his steps in a half-wakeful torpor." The terrors, torpors and partial redemptions of this collection feel wholly earned. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
At times didactic to American ears, the poetry of Nobel laureate Milosz has three overall subjects: the poet's Roman Catholic religion, which puts him in touch with his intuitive side; his native land, Lithuania, which connects him to its pagan roots; and the work of French metaphysical poet Oscar Milosz, his distant uncle and mentor. These subjects take an ironic twist in the metaphysical, mystical, generally blank-verse poems collected here. Often featuring stunning images ("The October from my poems with its air like wine"), they reminiscence about the poet's youth, mourn deceased loved ones, grapple with the mystery of the divine absence and presence, and pray to God, despite the poet's lack of faith. On one hand, Milosz writes of "the futility of human belief and of the supplications sent up to the throne of Absence." On the other, he observes, "Lord/ On my neck and my shoulders I feel your warm breath." Their irony intensified by the poet's recent death at 93, these poems have a chilling effect. Recommended for all libraries. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 6/15/04.] C. Diane Scharper, Towson Univ., Towson, MD (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
