Here in Robert Alter's bold new translation are some of the most
magnificent works in world literature. The astounding poetry in the Book
of Job is restored to its powerful ancient meanings and rhythms. The
creation account in its Voice from the Whirlwind is beautiful and
incendiary. By contrast, a serene fatalism suffuses Ecclesiastes with a
quiet beauty, and the pithy maxims of Proverbs impart a worldly wisdom
that is satirically shrewd. Each of these books addresses the universal
wisdom that the righteous thrive and the wicked suffer in a rational
moral order; together they are essential to the ancient canon that is
the Hebrew Bible.