Someone asked me why I had so many different copies of Neruda and I answered because no one book ever has all the poems or the translations that I want. That's the tricky thing about Neruda. It's also the reason I like dual translation editions, so I can see the original right next to the English.

This bilingual book of poems was published in 2004, the centennial celebration of Pablo Neruda's birth. The collection gives an overview of his writing over the lifetime of this great Latin American poet. The editor chose eight poets to do the translations. The poems presented include some sensual love poems, and some political poems about both Chile and the Spanish Civil War. He wrote earthy poems about vineyards, gardens, the sea, and the ruins of Macchu Picchu. Death was prominent in some of

5.0Some books are so good that they deserve to be given a place of prominence in a library, or book store. The Essential Neruda: Selected Poems was so beautiful, so haunting and so breathtakingly well written that it should be displayed only in the most prestigious of art galleries. Every word in this collections of poems, that covers a wide array of topics such as death, love, the Spanish Civil War, and worker's rights, feels as if it is a gift. This is why I love poetry!

Awesome, inspiring, picturesque, soothing, thought provoking, challenging, mystified, saddening - Neruda takes his reader through a plethora of the feelings, all the while never leaving his hand. And the reader would cling to it like a kid, fascinated to explore this new world full of wonders. Sometimes he makes you chuckle on the trivial detail looked from such an angel you'd never ever have imagined. Sometimes he leaves us in a mystified fog in heart or a rising smoke of craters of lava. The o...

I'll say that this, my first dip into the Neruda universe, affected me more than any encounter with 20th century poetry I've yet had. But I also haven't had many. I'm still at a "greatest hits" level when it comes to poetry, especially modern poetry. Before Neruda, I would have said Yates was my fave 20th century poet, much more than Eliot, but Neruda eclipsed them by a lot. There's a line in the editor's introduction that compares Neruda's style to red wine. The comparison really stuck with me

Neruda is perhaps most famous for his One Hundred Love Sonnets, especially XVII. He is also perhaps the greatest poet writing/having written in the Spanish language. Certainly his poetry transcends time - and this edition offers both the original Spanish and beautifully translated English versions. It's a great learning experience for people taking Spanish classes (like I am now). What more could you ask for?Allow me to offer the following as an example:Oda Al Libro (II): Ode to the Book (II)Boo...

I want you to knowone thing.You know how this is:if I lookat the crystal moon, at the red branchof the slow autumn at my window,if I touchnear the firethe impalpable ashor the wrinkled body of the log,everything carries me to you,as if everything that exists,aromas, light, metals,were little boatsthat sailtoward those isles of yours that wait for me.Well, now,if little by little you stop loving meI shall stop loving you little by little.If suddenlyyou forget medo not look for me,for I shall a

I see your dry currents moving,broken-off hands I see growing,I hear your oceanic plantscreaking, shaken by night and fury,and I feel leaves drying inwards,amassing green materialsto your desolate stillness.- - - I leaned my head into the deepest waves,I sank through the sulfuric peace,and, like a blind man, returned to the jasmineof the exhausted human springtime.- - -Your petals pound the surface of the world,your underwater grains are always trembling,the smooth green algae dangle their menac...

I can write the saddest verses tonightWrite, for example, "The night is full of stars, twinkling blue, in the distance."The night wind spins in the sky and sings. I can write the saddest verses tonight. I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too. On nights like this I held her in my arms. I kissed her so many times beneath the infinite sky. She loved me, at times I loved her too. How not to have loved her great still eyes. I can write the saddest verses tonight. To think that I don't have her....

Fable of the Mermaid and the DrunksAll those men were there inside,when she came in totally naked.They had been drinking: they began to spit.Newly come from the river, she knew nothing.She was a mermaid who had lost her way.The insults flowed down her gleaming flesh.Obscenities drowned her golden breasts.Not knowing tears, she did not weep tears.Not knowing clothes, she did not have clothes.They blackened her with burnt corks and cigarette stubs,and rolled around laughing on the tavern floor.She...

The Chilean Pablo Neruda is officially the sexiest poet ever, which, like, do you think that worked out well for him? It sounds good, but remember - he's still a poet. Being the sexiest of all poets is like being the kindest of all cats, right? I know what you're thinking, you're like what, are you crazy, people love poets, they get all kinds of horny for poets, read a girl/boy a poem and it's like guaranteed sploosh/sproing. But do they really? Ask yourself this: the situations you're thinking

Who wouldn’t love Pablo Neruda?My long-standing love affair with him started during Humanities class in college when my professor made us read and interpret “Tonight I Can Write”. I found it to be the saddest poem, but it was also hauntingly beautiful and enthralling and held a deeper connection with my own juvenile heartache. Since then, I never stopped getting moved by his poetry.

So glad I read this in both English and Spanish.

Leaning into the evenings I throw my sad netsto your ocean eyes.There my loneliness stretches and burns in the tallest bonfire,arms twisting like a drowning man's.I cast red signals over your absent eyeswhich lap like the sea at the lighthouse shore.You guard only darkness, my distant female,sometimes the coast of dread emerges from your stare.Leaning into the evenings I toss my sad netsto that sea which stirs your ocean eyes.The night birds peck at the first starsthat twinkle like my soul as I

To enter Neruda's world is to enter a place where words speak the unspeakable, words of power, class, and love. Neruda strips his world down to the essentials, and then cooks a feast of words on top of that, creating a sense of luxury, magic, and sometimes despair. His perspective is an essential one for the twentieth century.

Can I give this six stars?I had read very few of Neruda's poems before encountering this collection. He is now my favorite poet. I have read and re-read these diverse and gorgeous poems, and look forward to plunging deeper into his body of work. Although I know little Spanish, I value being able to try to read it in the facing page translation format; sometimes I can begin to discern untranslatable sounds, rhythms, and multiple meanings. Thank you, Mark Eisner, for this beautiful book.

Pablo Neruda is one of the most influential poets of the twentieth century and in this particular collection of his work, he showcases that through and through. Neruda’s usage of metaphors throughout his work is awe inspiring but it ranges from simple basic concepts to more advanced usages that require advance knowledge over the symbolism that he is attempting to enact in the reader's emotions. You see the simplistic metaphor usage in “I Can Write The Saddest Verses” where the meaning of the pie...

A beautiful and broad collection of his poems, from love to workers' rights...."On our earth, before writing was invented, before the printing press was invented, poetry flourished. That is why we know that poetry is like bread; it should be shared by all, by scholars and by peasants, by all our vast, incredible, extraordinary family of humanity." Pablo NerudaI Like You When You're QuietI like it when you're quiet. It's as if you weren't here now,and you heard me from a distance, and my voicecou...

There is no one like Neruda, particularly in the stunning imagery of the early poems. Nine translators are featured in this selection of Neruda’s work, Mark Eisner, John Felstiner, Forrest Gander, Robert Hass, Jack Hirschman, Stephen Kessler, Stephen Mitchell and Alastair Reid. Rather than quote poems in their entirety (as they deserve to be read) I’ll note just a few of the images that resonated for me. “death’s arrival on the ox’s tongue” “come near with an apple and a horse,/because there in