Tarjei Vesaas's fame as one of Norway's and Scandinavia's greatest fiction
writers of the 20th century has often overshadowed his achievement as a
poet. This revised bilingual selection presents, in finely honed translations, forty six
poems that reveal the distinctive sensibility and voice of Vesaas the
poet.
In a groundbreaking introductory essay, Roger Greenwald explores why
Vesaas's work has eluded many attempts at critical analysis and how it
challenges received notions of modernism. A collage of excerpts from
Vesaas's writings about himself and his work supplies helpful background
and gives some sense of the man behind the work. Vesaas emerges from
this volume as a lyric and meditative poet of uncommon depth, who renders
states of being beyond the reach not only of discourse, but of most poetry as
well