If you have taste for "the best words in the best order", i.e. poetry, here is one of the most beautiful pieces of poetry i've ever read. "Lost in translation" by James Merrill was written in 1970s; it's blank verse with rubayat insertions. The poem is about a boy who spends one summer with his french (not so french as we get to know later) governess waiting for the delivery of a puzzle from NY and then assembling that puzzle with her.
The poem itself is a puzzle; it is wrought with a rare craftsmanship and the details of this puzzle are of rare beauty indeed. The spiritism seance where the medium divines the piece of puzzle which boy has stolen from the set years ago and kept with him his whole life; boy's misinterpretation of mademoiselle's letter concerning his parents future divorce; shadows of Valery and Rilke travelling through the poem. Even the remembering of the details of the poem is a pleasant affair.
Links that are very helpful for getting the nuances: wiki, collection of reviews (very good) and a good translation by Grigoriy Kruzhkov for russian audience (i'm still pretending that someone is actually reading this entry, very funny)
Enjoy!
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peculiar poem
ReplyDeletewhy peculiar?
ReplyDeletedid you try to read the original, too?
it is many-sided poem, kind of polyphony of time, and it provokes peculiar feeling. it is look like author mind's game (=puzzle). too much puzzles in one poem)
ReplyDeletei didn't try to read the original, because it took a while for understanding to translation)