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Odes to Common Things, Bilingual Edition

A bilingual collection of 25 newly translated odes by the century's greatest Spanish-language poet, each accompanied by a pair of exquisite pencil drawings. From bread and soap to a bed and a box of tea, the "odes to common things" collected here conjure up the essence of their subjects clearly and wondrously. 50 b&w illustrations

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Pablo Neruda--the last great poet. Every time I pick up one of his books I'm startled back in to coherence. "Odes to Common Things" is no exception. His elevation of what you and I take for granted to entities of self-completeness is nothing short of brilliance. When I see a chair all I see is a place to plant my weary body, but with Neruda the chair is transformed into something wildly exotic, transcendent and magical. "Ode to the dictionary" will make you regret not using yours more. A tell-tale sign of reading profound poetry is an encroaching sense of self-disgust. I rarely fail to acheive this feeling when reading Neruda. So if you're in the mood to be simutaneously elevated and degraded, read "Ode to Common Things", a book that is anything but common. --Reviewer: Terri Fawn Howard from Plano, TX United States

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Common Things Turned Uncommonly Beautiful
The Odes to Common Things was written toward the end of Neruda's life, in a voice steeped in the wisdom of a life experienced in the greatest joys and horrors of the 20th century. When Neruda writes about a table, a chair, flowers, socks, or soap, these common things become more than everyday banal objects: they are transformed and elevated into metaphors, vehicles for the greater questions that haunt our lives, capturing the often overlooked beauty of everyday life, of the little things that we seem to remember only in our twilight.

Ken Krabbenhoft's translation is good, but often, as with other translations, it fails to capture the true spirit of the Spanish words (but not at his fault). It is for this reason I gave it four instead of five stars.

My personal favorites include: "Oda al Pan" (Ode to Bread); "Oda a la Cama" (Ode to the Bed); and, "Oda al Violin de California" (Ode to a Violin in California), perhaps because Neruda's inspiration may have come from walking the same shores that I too walk in barefoot pleasure.--ross saciuk