![]() ![]() "Weather incongruously occupies the writer’s room. "Climate" is likely an ekphrastic poem based on any of several paintings by Magritte in which the separation between interior and exterior is either confounded or based on an illusion. Phillis Webb (Canadian poet and broadcaster, Order of Canada) Though ego and energy, driving force and central insight into our culture like this could easily disperse the poetry, I suspect we'll be hearing more from Robert Zend. He has arrived wham-bam into the North American scene which he is both a part of and apart from. John Robert Colombo, translator of the collection (on the book jacket) Among many exciting discoveries, Robert Zend was the big one for me. ![]() I have translated his poems into English to remedy this sad situation. But because he writes his witty, inventive, resourceful and extremely imaginative poems in his native language, he is known only to a handful of Canadians. If Robert Zend were writing in English or French, he would be recognized as one of Canada's leading poets. John Robert Colombo, in The Oxford Companion to Canadian Literature, Toronto, Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 1983 Imaginative, almost surreal fugues are characteristic of longer poems that appear in From Zero to One: an automatic record player begins to play records for its own enjoyment the ghost of a dead wife continues to haunt the family home office-workers take refuge in a secret room that seems to exist in another dimension and a message from outer space proves to be either nonsense or higher sense. His poems display a ready wit and frequent flights of fancy.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |