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A review by sarapalooza
Pan Tadeusz: The Last Foray in Lithuania by Adam Mickiewicz
4.0
Mickiewicz’s national epic has long been on my to-read list, but I’m not going to lie — it is intimidating!! Almost as intimidating as the name of the rhyme scheme in which it is set: “trzynastozgłoskowiec” (or for non Polish speakers - thirteen syllable lines, with some caesuras and stresses thrown in). No big deal… right? Right…?
Thanks to the incredible work of translator Bill Johnston who rendered the poem into a loose iambic pentameter with some lovely word play, humor, and enjambement, this work is finally made accessible, enjoyable, and really quite beautiful in English. With the help of Mickiewicz and Johnston’s notes, the sense of time and place comes to life.
The artful depictions of nature and the forests of Poland, the memorable characters, the epic battles - what a hearty read. It’s like the bigos of books. The hunting scene had me turning pages and feeling like I was binging a series on Netflix and the Epilogue had me reaching for the Kleenex.
So happy to have finally befriended Mickiewicz…. He wasn’t so scary after all!
Curious what native Polish speakers’ experiences with this book are. I’m told it is often taught in school, and there’s nothing like being tested on a poem to take away the magic.
#mickiewicz #pantadeusz
Thanks to the incredible work of translator Bill Johnston who rendered the poem into a loose iambic pentameter with some lovely word play, humor, and enjambement, this work is finally made accessible, enjoyable, and really quite beautiful in English. With the help of Mickiewicz and Johnston’s notes, the sense of time and place comes to life.
The artful depictions of nature and the forests of Poland, the memorable characters, the epic battles - what a hearty read. It’s like the bigos of books. The hunting scene had me turning pages and feeling like I was binging a series on Netflix and the Epilogue had me reaching for the Kleenex.
So happy to have finally befriended Mickiewicz…. He wasn’t so scary after all!
Curious what native Polish speakers’ experiences with this book are. I’m told it is often taught in school, and there’s nothing like being tested on a poem to take away the magic.
#mickiewicz #pantadeusz