Falling from Silence: Poems - Hardcover

The ancient Greeks and Romans created European civilization, and studying their literature--the classics--has long been considered a civilizing activity. But the classics also teach plenty about chaos, not least that the human heart is never satisfied. Slavitt, who has translated classical literature, shows that he has learned civilization in the formal dexterity of his verse, that they have learned the turbulent heart in the content of his poems. Slavitt has largely shaken off regrets and assumed the great Jewish obligation and passion for arguing, maybe not always with God but always with the way things are said to be. If "an instant's sin endures forever," he asks, why not a moment of grace or of beauty? And why must time flow in one direction only? He questions beauty and its satisfactions, whether the beauty produced by honed talent in "Performance: An Eclogue," or the beauty descried by honed perceptions in "Against Landscape." He speculates that Moses was barred from the promised land because by bringing down the Torah, he "did not / diminish heaven so much as elevate earth." Slavitt complements his querulous querying with rancorous humor (see "Spite"); bittersweet resignation (see the self-scouring "Culls"); wordplay ("Cake and Milk," for instance, consists entirely of cliches); classical references and translations from Greek, Latin, Hebrew, French, and German; and a grandfather's love. He has written many civilized books, but has he written any more broadly and deeply civilized than this one? Ray Olson
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