Chisel of Remembrance - Softcover

Vera Schwarcz

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0981788327 ISBN 13: 9780981788326

Publisher: Antrim House, 2009

Synopsis

Chisel of Remembrance is devoted to the premise that in the cultural and communal traditions of all peoples, be they Chinese, Jewish or Tibetean, there is what Yeats called a ceremony of innocence offering salvation from the mere anarchy loosed when the past is forgotten. In poems concerning the classical arts of creation, the value of remembrance, the havoc wrought by war and revolution, and the peace gained by ancient practices of meditation and devotion to the present, the author urges us to hear the voice within the silence. Reviewers have praised the exciting combination of passion, wisdom, and historical perspective present in this new poetry collection by Vera Schwarcz. Stanley Moss finds the work of Schwarcz to be "poetry of a very high order, simultaneously informed by English, Chinese, Hungarian, Romanian, German, Hebrew, and Jewish religious tradition. I place English first only because the book is written in English. But I hear Chinese, a language I do not know, as dominant while post-Holocaust emotion is ever-present... This politically charged poetry with its abhorrence of suffering also teaches a profound love of nature, while providing the simple pleasures Auden required."

About this title

About the Author:

Vera Schwarcz was born and raised in Cluj, Romania, where she began her explorations of poetry in several languages. Her mother tongues include Hungarian and Romanian, with Yiddish, German, Hebrew, Russian and French added along the way. After emigrating to the United States in 1962, she pursued degrees in East Asian studies and history at Vassar, Yale and Stanford. A member of the first group of exchange scholars to be sent to China in the spring of 1979, she has returned to Beijing repeatedly during the past three decades. All along, her corpus of scholarly writing has been accompanied by the publication of poems in several languages in the United States, Europe and Asia. The daughter of Holocaust survivors, Schwarcz has made the quest for remembrance a central theme in all her works. Her writing has been nominated for the National Jewish Book Award and has been accorded several major grants, including a Guggenheim Fellowship. Currently, Vera Schwarcz is serving as Director of the Center for East Asian Studies at Wesleyan University and holds the Freeman Chair in East Asian Studies. She lives with her husband and children in West Hartford, Connecticut.

Review:

"Vera Schwarcz's words are precise brushstrokes that reveal and illuminate what she loves, celebrates, mourns, and desires. For this poet, the past does not recede into the realm of forgotten history but rushes forward into the present. In this engaging and elegant book, Schwarcz wields the chisel of remembrance that, delicately, delicately, finds its way to what is sacred, necessary, and in the right hands lasting." --Charles Ades Fishman

"These deceptively simple, direct poems are organic in the best sense, drawing deeply from roots in Jewish, Chinese, and other ancient traditions and arising as naturally as a deep breath at the first light of dawn. They are a pleasure." --Sam Hamill

"Into the corpus of Vera Schwarcz's shimmering poetry and meditations comes this outstanding book of new poems, Chisel of Remembrance, which offers the reader a combination telescope/microscope as the poet ponders Chinese, Jewish, and personal culture. Again and again it offers lines I want to read aloud, enjoying their chemical mix of feeling and intellect. You never know what s around the next corner: an art collector, blinded clocks, wild chirping, alphabets, cherry bark, date fronds, the scent of peace, or Confucius himself... This bright and eloquent book will keep Vera Schwarcz in the light for many years." --Michele F. Cooper

About this edition

• Publisher: Antrim House
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 0981788327
• ISBN 13: 9780981788326
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 76