Book record
Songbook
Umberto Saba
Translated from Italian by George Hochfield
Songbook, by Umberto Saba and translated by George Hochfield and Leonard Nathan, brings one of the central Italian poets of the twentieth century into English through the very form his work made iconic. Saba’s Canzoniere is a life’s book: intimate, autobiographical, musical, and psychologically direct in ways that still feel startling. The title Songbook matters because these are not merely individual poems but a long lyric record of self, city, love, family, and wound. Hochfield and Nathan’s translation gives English readers a major point of entry into Saba’s humane intelligence. I would read Songbook for its plainness and depth. Saba can feel approachable without being simple, which is one of poetry’s rarest gifts: a clear voice carrying a complicated life.
- Published
- 2008
- Publisher
- Yale University Press
- Language
- Italian
- Country
- Italy
- ISBN
- 9780300136036