A New York Times Book Review "New & Noteworthy" Poetry Collection
A Book Riot "Best Fall 2020 Book in Translation"
Stone-Garland, this new entry in the Seedbank Series, presents
translations of six poets of the Greek lyric tradition. Anecdotes of
Simonides, Anacreon, Archilochus, Theognis, Alcman, and Callimachus may
be easy to come by but their poems are restored less often. That's a
loss that this anthology remedies. Reading ancient poetry is a simple
pleasure, like strolling through a cemetery overgrown with wildflowers.
Imagine the graveyard filled with broken stones, each with a fragment
that could compose a poem. Stone by stone you build a garland that
represents a possible vision of a world long gone.
Dan Beachy-Quick is our guide on this walk through a ruin of lyric
poetry. To these reclaimed fragments he brings a love of discovery
through lyricism. Beachy-Quick's translations take joy in the
intricacies of ancient Greek and logophiles will find treats in these
pages. Returning to the foundations of a poetic tradition that has
evolved throughout the ages is a chance to rekindle past identities and
relationships to the world.