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by Leonor Scliar-Cabral (Author), Alexis Levitin (Translator)
Horns rise up with force, igneous, aglow,
to burst apart the mysteries of time,
while scribes revive prophetic words, divine,
on pure papyrus, salvaged long ago.
A bilingual treasure trove, that is the Portuguese poetry of Leonor Scliar-Cabral and the stellar rendering into English, by her trusted translator Alexis Levitin. Translation is an art and interpretation - delving deep into the realm of Scliar-Cabral's letters, Levitin crafts sonnets that feel sacred and mysterious.
Lenore Scliar-Cabral's Consecration of the Aleph Bet-startling, profound, masterfully composed and erudite-belongs in the good company it keeps, taking its place beside Rimbaud's Voyelles, Karl Shapiro's The Alphabet, Terrance Hayes' How to Draw a Perfect Circle, and Molly Peacock's Alphabetique among others. A delight, a tutorial, a meditation-of which, yes, Borges would heartily approve.
-Danny Lawless, Editor of Plumes
Leonor Scliar-Cabral writes poems of intensity and great beauty, marrying intellect and passion, as exemplified in her extraordinary collection Consecration of the Aleph Bet. This collection of 22 sonnets, one for each letter of the Hebrew alphabet, is a tour de force: The sonnet form has rarely served so expansive an undertaking as it brilliantly serves here. Each letter's sonnet embraces history, geography, religion, and the human condition, as in these powerful evocative lines from two poems: "Like Job, we're prisoners of straightened spaces / ...Our hangman is a silent clock, stopped dead, / ... Garroted, we gaze ahead." and "A long Phoenician keel with fanning oars / for seven moons plows through the darkened seas..." Consecration of the Aleph Bet includes the original Portuguese text and Alexis Levitin's sensitive translation, expertly maintaining the original's meaning and the musicality of the demanding sonnet form. Scliar-Cabral's haunting complex poems amply reward repeated readings.
-Miriam N. Kotzin, author of Debris Field
