Tomas Transtromer won the Nobel Prize in 2011, but like most authors in translation, it always takes some time for the collected works to trickle into our American bookstores and onto our shelves. I may still be a little late to the parade, shouting praise of Transtromer’s The Great Enigma, but I think he’s worthy of the attention.
Tomas Transtromer is the Swedish Robert Frost. The staccato images of his poems pull you into the woods, into a natural world in which truth is just below the ice on the frozen pond.
Transtromer made a name for himself as a poet in Sweden in the 1970s and 80s, having published several small, but well received, collections. In 1990, he suffered a stroke that damaged his right hand, and made his speech difficult to understand. 6 years later, he published The Sad Gondola.
“From July 1990”
It was a funeral
and I felt the dead man
was reading my thoughts
better than I could.The organ was silent, the birds sang.
The grave out in the sunshine.
My friend’s voice belonged
on the far side of the minutes.I drove home seen through
by the glitter of the summer day
by rain and quietness
seen through by the moon.
Airmail, released this month by Graywolf Press, is the collected letters of the American poet, Robert Bly, and Tomas Transtromer. The book is an intimate portrait of the two men, as well as an opportunity to eavesdrop on their conversations on poetry, art, life, and the art of translation. The wisdom these men share! (and the cartoon drawings are pretty great, too)
original text of Air Mail
“Air Mail”
On the hunt for a mailbox
I took the letter through the city.
In the big forest of stone and concrete
the straying butterfly flickered.The flying-carpet of the stamp
the staggering lines of the address
plus my own sealed truth
soaring now over the ocean.The Atlantic’s creeping silver.
The cloud banks. The fishing boat
like a spat-out olive-stone.
And the pale scars of the wakes.Down here work goes slowly.
I ogle the clock often.
The tree-shadows are black ciphers
in the greedy silence.The truth’s there, on the ground
but no one dares to take it.
The truth’s there, on the street.
No one makes it his own.
And if you like this poetry, you will like this music by Edward Elgar (The Enigma Variations)
Comments are closed.