Les ziaux by Raymond Queneau and translated by Daniela Hurezanu

This is poetry from France.

Les ziaux by Raymond Queneau translated by Daniela Hurezanu is published by Black Widow Press. This is a Book originally written in French. This was published in 2008.0 and has the ISBN of 9.780979513749E12.

Les ziaux, by Raymond Queneau and translated by Daniela Hurezanu from French, brings France French-language poetry into English through Queneau’s play, vernacular intelligence, and the elastic pleasures of French word-making. The metadata gives the reader a doorway, but the real value is what happens once the poem starts making its own weather. I would read it for eyes, slang, laughter, and the old modernist joy of letting language misbehave, not as a fixed lesson about a country or period. The best entry point is still the poem itself: the line that catches, the image that refuses to explain itself, the feeling that arrives before paraphrase. Les ziaux belongs in the translated poetry library because it gives the library a livelier comic-experimental French current.

If you’d like to see international poetry continue and gain traction, consider requesting this work from your local library, or purchasing it from places like Open Books (a poetry only bookstore), Asterism Books (an independent press distributor), or bookshop.org to connect you with your local bookstores.

Check out more of the always in-progress translated poetry index here.