Ritsos is the real thing, and this selection is the best English version available. Though not nearly as well known as Cavafy, Seferis [a Nobel laureate] and Elytis, Ritsos surpasses them all. Sometimes his poems comment directly on life in the present, sometimes on the mythic Greek past, sometimes on the way in which the mythic past reverberates into the present. Though he also wrote long, Browningesque dramatic monologues, the pure distillation of his lyrics truly shine, and many of his best lyrics are assembled in this volume. Surely there are many expendable poems here, but the best poems--of which there are a few dozen at least--are among the best poems written in the twentieth century: direct, lean, attuned to the way in which a collection of words on paper can bring a moment of human life, whether now or thousands of years ago, to immediacy right before our eyes

Ritsos is an intriguing poet and this new volume helps to enter his world with images well rendered in the translations and in the essays that accompany it. Louis Aragon's admiration may stem from his left wing sentiments but still it is judicious and on the whole convincing. Ritsos is one of the world's great poets.