Books by Peter Cole
The Poetry of Kabbalah: Mystical Verse from the Jewish Tradition (The Margellos World Republic of Letters)
by Peter Cole
This groundbreaking collection presents for the first time in English a substantial body of poetry that emerges directly from the sublime and often startling world of Jewish mysticism. Taking up Gershom Scholem’s call to plumb the “tremendous poetic potential” concealed in the Kabbalistic tradition, Peter Cole provides dazzling renderings of work composed on three continents over a period of some fifteen hundred years.
In addition to the translations and the texts in their original languages, Cole supplies a lively and insightful introduction, along with accessible commentaries to the poems. Aminadav Dykman adds an elegant afterword that places the work in the context of world literature. As a whole, the collection brings readers into the fascinating force field of Kabbalistic verse, where the building blocks of both language and existence itself are unveiled.
Excerpts from The Poetry of Kabbalah have been featured in the Paris Review, Poetry, and Conjunctions.
“Studded with insight, and written with great verve, this book will become a classic.”—Lawrence Fine, author of Physician of the Soul, Healer of the Cosmos
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The Poetry of Kabbalah: Mystical Verse from the Jewish Tradition (The Margellos World Republic of Letters)
by Peter Cole
The first ever English-language collection of poetry from the Kabbalistic tradition, masterfully translated by MacArthur-winning poet Peter Cole
This groundbreaking collection presents for the first time in English a substantial body of poetry that emerges directly from the sublime and often startling world of Jewish mysticism. Taking up Gershom Scholem’s call to plumb the “tremendous poetic potential” concealed in the Kabbalistic tradition, Peter Cole provides dazzling renderings of work composed on three continents over a period of some fifteen hundred years.
In addition to the translations and the texts in their original languages, Cole supplies a lively and insightful introduction, along with accessible commentaries to the poems. Aminadav Dykman adds an elegant afterword that places the work in the context of world literature. As a whole, the collection brings readers into the fascinating force field of Kabbalistic verse, where the building blocks of both language and existence itself are unveiled.
Excerpts from The Poetry of Kabbalah have been featured in the Paris Review, Poetry, and Conjunctions.
“Studded with insight, and written with great verve, this book will become a classic.”—Lawrence Fine, author of Physician of the Soul, Healer of the Cosmos
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Things on Which I've Stumbled
by Peter Cole
Remarkable poetry by the widely acclaimed poet and translator of Hebrew and Arabic poetry. In Peter Cole's remarkable new book, the forces and sources that have long driven his work come together in singular fashion. Things on Which I've Stumbled rides a variable music that takes it from an archeology of mysterious poetic fragments unearthed in an ancient Egyptian synagogue to poignant political commentary on the blighted hills surrounding modern Jerusalem. Cole's vision of connectedness, his wit, and his grounded wisdom, along with his keen sense of literature's place in a meaningful life, render these poems at once fresh and abiding. Widely acclaimed for his translations from Hebrew and Arabic, Cole is also the author of two highly praised collections of poems. Writing in The New York Review of Books, Harold Bloom called Peter Cole "a major poet-translator." In Things on Which I've Stumbled, he turns to translating the world.
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The Invention of Influence
by Peter Cole
A dazzling new book by a writer with "perhaps the most capacious command of the Jewish poetic tradition of any poet now writing in English"(Religion and Literature) Peter Cole has been called "an inspired writer" (The Nation) and “one of the handful of authentic poets of his own American generation” (Harold Bloom). In this, his fourth book of poems, he presents a ramifying vision of human linkage. At the heart of the collection stands the stunning title poem, which brings us into the world of Victor Tausk, a maverick and tragic early disciple of Freud who wrote about one of his patients’ mental inventions ― an "influence machine" that controlled his thoughts. In Cole’s symphonic poem, this machine becomes a haunting image for the ways in which tradition and the language of others shape so much of what we think and say. The shorter poems in this rich and surprising volume treat the dynamics of coupling, the curiously varied nature of perfection,the delights of the senses, the perils of poetic vocation, and more.
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The Collected Poems of Avraham Ben Yitzhak
by Peter Cole, Avraham Ben Yitzhak, Hannan Hever
From The Washington Post Avraham Ben Yitzhak (1883-1950) was one of the most enigmatic, reticent and solitary figures in modern Hebrew poetry. He was an aristocrat of the spirit who cultivated silence and published a total of 11 poems during his lifetime. All of them are astonishing. His output may have been meager -- he never published a book and stopped writing poems by the age of 45 -- but his accomplishment is unquestionable. I first heard of Ben Yitzhak in Elias Canetti's memoir of the 1930s, The Play of the Eyes. Who was this mysterious figure who was born Abraham Sonne in Galicia (Poland), spent much of his life in Vienna and eventually settled in Jerusalem? Canetti remembered that Sonne, who was also close to the novelist Hermann Broch, "inspired an addiction such as I had never experienced for any other intellectual." "Sonne knew a great deal by heart. . . . [H]e had memorized the whole Bible and could quote any passage in Hebrew without hesitation. But he performed these mnemonic feats with restraint and never made a show of them. . . . His way of reciting and interpreting certain short chapters came as a revelation to me; I realized that he must be a poet, and in the Hebrew language." Sonne was a curious kind of Hebrew poet, though -- a figure who seemed worthy and in some ways comparable to his primary German models, Hölderlin, Rilke, Trakl and Hofmannsthal, but was also with a painfully small oeuvre. "My heart/ has been eaten by lightning," he would confess in one fragment. "As their thoughts circled a man was bitterly seeking," he wrote in another. One thinks of him as a refined, charismatic and reclusive figure ("He had the same method in dealing with persons and things," Canetti recalled, and conceived "of individuals as distinct fields of knowledge"), a man of tremendous intellectual curiosity, encyclopedic learning and lethal silences. I like Lea Goldberg's story of how a friend once joked to him, "Nu? Perhaps we can be silent now about something else?" It is now possible to read Ben Yitzhak's Collected Poems -- his 11 canonical lyrics, a rejected 12th poem and a striking group of drafts and fragments -- in an edition expertly edited by Hannan Hever and brilliantly translated by Peter Cole. There is a rare purity and even nobility in Ben Yitzhak's work, which, as Hever points out, is deeply rooted in scripture, in what the poet called "the voice of ancient song." Cole captures the biblical rhythms and allusions with terrific dexterity. He finds a voice for Ben Yitzhak's modernist psalms, his 20th-century lamentations, his prophetic silences. Here is Ben Yitzhak's last published poem, "Blessed Are They Who Sow and Do Not Reap . . . " In The Modern Hebrew Poem Itself, Dan Pagis, Hebrew poet and translator, argues that it "affirms the poet's conviction and confidence in silence as the only true mode of self-expression."Blessed Are They Who Sow and Do Not Reap . . .Blessed are they who sow and do not reap -- they shall wander in extremity.Blessed are the generous whose glory in youth has enhanced the extravagant brightness of days -- who shed their accoutrements at the crossroads.Blessed are the proud whose pride overflows the banks of their souls to become the modesty of whiteness in the wake of a rainbow's ascent through a cloud.Blessed are they who know their hearts will cry out from the wilderness and that quiet will blossom from their lips.Blessed are these for they will be gathered to the heart of the world, wrapped in the mantle of oblivion -- their destiny's offering unuttered to the end.By Edward Hirsch Copyright 2004, The Washington Post Co. All Rights Reserved. Product Description Poetry. Jewish Studies. Translated by Peter Cole. Introduced by Hannan Hever. Avraham Ben Yitzhak, also known as Abraham Sonne, was a Galicia-born, Berlin-and-Vienna-bred Hebrew writer who fled Europe for Palestine in the late thirties. In a career lasting decades, he published only eleven poems, yet he is co
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Sacred Trash: The Lost and Found World of the Cairo Geniza (Jewish Encounters Series)
NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARD FINALIST
WINNER OF THE 2012 AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION’S SOPHIE BRODY AWARD FOR OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT IN JEWISH LITERATURE
Sacred Trash tells the remarkable story of the Cairo Geniza—a synagogue repository for worn-out texts that turned out to contain the most vital cache of Jewish manuscripts ever discovered.
This tale of buried communal treasure weaves together unforgettable portraits of Solomon Schechter and the other modern heroes responsible for the collection’s rescue with explorations of the medieval documents themselves—letters and poems, wills and marriage contracts, Bibles, money orders, fiery dissenting religious tracts, fashion-conscious trousseaux lists, prescriptions, petitions, and mysterious magical charms. Presenting a panoramic view of almost a thousand years of vibrant Mediterranean Judaism, Adina Hoffman and Peter Cole bring contemporary readers into the heart of this little-known trove, whose contents have rightly been dubbed “the Living Sea Scrolls.” Part biography, part meditation on the supreme value the Jewish people has long placed in the written word, Sacred Trash is above all a gripping tale of adventure and redemption.
(With black-and-white illustrations throughout.)
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Sacred Trash: The Lost and Found World of the Cairo Geniza (Jewish Encounters Series)
NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARD FINALIST
Part of the Jewish Encounter series
One May day in 1896, at a dining-room table in Cambridge, England, a meeting took place between a Romanian-born maverick Jewish intellectual and twin learned Presbyterian Scotswomen, who had assembled to inspect several pieces of rag paper and parchment. It was the unlikely start to what would prove a remarkable, continent-hopping, century-crossing saga, and one that in many ways has revolutionized our sense of what it means to lead a Jewish life.
In Sacred Trash, MacArthur-winning poet and translator Peter Cole and acclaimed essayist Adina Hoffman tell the story of the retrieval from an Egyptian geniza, or repository for worn-out texts, of the most vital cache of Jewish manuscripts ever discovered. This tale of buried scholarly treasure weaves together unforgettable portraits of Solomon Schechter and the other heroes of this drama with explorations of the medieval documents themselves—letters and poems, wills and marriage contracts, Bibles, money orders, fiery dissenting tracts, fashion-conscious trousseaux lists, prescriptions, petitions, and mysterious magical charms. Presenting a panoramic view of nine hundred years of vibrant Mediterranean Judaism, Hoffman and Cole bring modern readers into the heart of this little-known trove, whose contents have rightly been dubbed “the Living Sea Scrolls.” Part biography and part meditation on the supreme value the Jewish people has long placed on the written word, Sacred Trash is above all a gripping tale of adventure and redemption.
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Hebrew Writers on Writing (The Writer's World)
Hebrew Writers on Writing offers a fresh look at well-known figures such as Haim Nahman Bialik and Yehuda Amichai, while also introducing a host of fascinating yet little- or never-before translated writers. Drawing from essays, letters, notebooks, poems, interviews, and other sources, it begins in early 20th-century Warsaw, wanders through the formative years of Hebrew modernism in Europe and Palestine, and explores the charged complexity of contemporary Israel. In the process, it probes, as no English-language volume has before, the shifting cultural and political landscape Hebrew emerged from, providing readers with an intimate vision of a startlingly rich and diverse body of work. These selections from 49 writers have been rendered by a group of some of the finest English translators in the field, and each piece is introduced by editor, noted poet, and MacArthur fellow Peter Cole.
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Wobblies of the World: A Global History of the IWW (Wildcat)
by Peter Cole, David Struthers, Kenyon Zimmer
“As a second-generation member of the IWW, I am delighted to see this outstanding collection of essays on the Wobblies, their achievements, and their substantial impact despite severe repression”—Noam Chomsky
Founded in 1905, Chicago's Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) is a union unlike any other. With members affectionately called "Wobblies" and an evolutionary and internationalist philosophy and tactics, it rapidly grew across the world. Considering the history of the IWW from an international perspective for the first time, Wobblies of the World brings together a group of leading scholars to present a lively collection of accounts from thirteen diverse countries, revealing a fascinating story of anarchism, syndicalism, and socialism. Chapters include:
*”A Cosmopolitan Crowd”: Transnational Anarchists, the IWW and the American Radical Press by Kenyon Zimmer
*Living Social Dynamite: Early Twentieth-Century IWW-South Asia Connections by Tariq Khan
*IWW Internationalism and Interracial Organizing in the Southwestern United States by David M. Struthers
*Spanish Anarchists and Maritime Workers in the IWW by Bieito Alonso
*The IWW and the Dilemmas of Labor Internationalism by Wayne Thorpe
*Wobblies Down Under: The IWW in Australia by Verity Burgmann
*Ki Nga Kaimahi Maori ('To All Maori Workers'): The New Zealand IWW and the Maori by Mark Derby
*Patrick Hodgens Hickey and the IWW: A Transnational Relationship by Peter Clayworth
*Edith Frenette: A Transnational Radical Life by Heather Mayer
*Tom Barker and Revolutionary Europe by Paula de Angelis
*P. J. Welinder and “American Syndicalism” in Interwar Sweden by Johan Pries
*Tramp, Tramp, Tramp: The Songs of Joe Hill Around the World by Bucky Halker
*And much, much more!
Drawing on many important figures of the movement—Har Dayal, James Larkin, William D. "Big Bill" Haywood, Enrique Flores Magón, and more—the contributors describe how the IWW and its ideals spread, exploring the crucial role the IWW played in industries such as shipping, mining, and agriculture.
Ultimately, the book illuminates Wobblie methods of organizing, forms of expression, practices, and transnational issues, offering a fascinating alternative history of the group
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Hymns & Qualms New and Selected Poems and Translations
by Peter Cole
“[Peter Cole’s] poetry is perhaps most remarkable for its combination of intellectual rigor with delight in surface, for how its prosody returns each abstraction to the body, linking thought and breath, metaphysics and musicality. Religious, erotic, elegiac, pissed off—the affective range is wide and the forms restless.” —Ben Lerner, BOMB
Hymns & Qualms brings together MacArthur Fellow Peter Cole’s acclaimed poetry and translations, weaving them into a helical whole. Praised for his “prosodic mastery” and “keen moral intelligence” (American Poets), and for the “rigor, vigor, joy, and wit” of his poetry (The Paris Review), Cole has created a vital, unclassifiable body of work that plumbs centuries of wisdom while paying sharp attention to the textures and tensions of the present. He is, Harold Bloom writes, “a matchless translator and one of the handful of authentic poets in his own American generation. Hymns & Qualms is a majestic work, a chronicle of the imaginative life of a profoundly spiritual consciousness.”
Cole is a maker—of poems and worlds. From his earliest registrations of the Jerusalem landscape’s stark power to electric renderings of mystical medieval Hebrew hymns; from his kabbalistically inspired recent poems to sensuous versions of masterworks of Muslim Spain; and from his provocative presentation of contemporary poetry from Palestine and Israel to his own dazzling reckonings with politics, beauty, and the double-edged dynamic of influence, Cole offers a ramifying vision of connectedness. In the process, he defies traditional distinctions between new and old, familiar and foreign, translation and original—“as though,” in his own words, “living itself were an endless translation.”
Copies
No copies available.
Hymns & Qualms New and Selected Poems and Translations
by Peter Cole
“[Peter Cole’s] poetry is perhaps most remarkable for its combination of intellectual rigor with delight in surface, for how its prosody returns each abstraction to the body, linking thought and breath, metaphysics and musicality. Religious, erotic, elegiac, pissed off—the affective range is wide and the forms restless.”
—Ben Lerner, BOMB
Hymns & Qualms brings together MacArthur Fellow Peter Cole’s acclaimed poetry and translations, weaving them into a helical whole. Praised for his “prosodic mastery” and “keen moral intelligence” (American Poets), and for the “rigor, vigor, joy, and wit” of his poetry (The Paris Review), Cole has created a vital, unclassifiable body of work that plumbs centuries of wisdom while paying sharp attention to the textures and tensions of the present. He is, Harold Bloom writes, “a matchless translator and one of the handful of authentic poets in his own American generation. Hymns & Qualms is a majestic work, a chronicle of the imaginative life of a profoundly spiritual consciousness.”
Cole is a maker—of poems and worlds. From his earliest registrations of the Jerusalem landscape’s stark power to electric renderings of mystical medieval Hebrew hymns; from his kabbalistically inspired recent poems to sensuous versions of masterworks of Muslim Spain; and from his provocative presentation of contemporary poetry from Palestine and Israel to his own dazzling reckonings with politics, beauty, and the double-edged dynamic of influence, Cole offers a ramifying vision of connectedness. In the process, he defies traditional distinctions between new and old, familiar and foreign, translation and original—“as though,” in his own words, “living itself were an endless translation.”
Copies
No copies available.