Leopardi’s “La Sera Del Di Festa” (“The Evening of the Holiday” (that translations not one to which I will refer, … More

Here is the first stanza of “Obsession,” from Aaron Poochigian’s wonderful new translation of Baudelaire: Vast woods, you scare me … More

How long does it take to absorb an influence, to learn what the insights of another mean? A couple of … More

The Fire of Drift-wood DEVEREUX FARM, NEAR MARBLEHEAD. We sat within the farm-house old,       Whose windows, looking o’er the bay, … More

It’s true enough that Robert Browning’s enduring preoccupation was the perpetual fracturing of truth. But that preoccupation persists through poetry … More

The first chorus of Swinburne’s Atalanta in Calydon is by widely accepted as one of his finest achievements—susceptible, as all … More

O blithe New-comer! I have heard,I hear thee and rejoice.O Cuckoo! shall I call thee Bird,Or but a wandering Voice? … More

Though he does so only indirectly, Coleridge raises the question of whether literature can be considered a form of knowledge? … More