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Informationen zum Autor Ben Okri Klappentext "This moving collection of poems from the Booker Prize-winning author finds strength and hope while reflecting on the complex issues that have plagued Africa. First published in 1992, Ben Okri's remarkable debut poetry collection plays with the mystique of the "Dark Continent," countering simplistic narratives of suffering that have been imposed on it with vibrant, nuanced portraits of the traditions and resilience of the African people"-- Leseprobe Introduction Poetry emerges from a unique way of looking at life, a unique way of feeling, within the matrix of language. The great questions of life are poetic questions. “If an apple falls, does the moon fall too?” asked Isaac Newton. This question gave rise to the science of gravity and the invention of quantum physics. The poems in my first collection were gathered over a period of a decade or more. I had just accomplished a transition from science to writing, from physics to poetry. Early on I saw poetry sublimated in the great scientific equations. Poetry for me then was as much about observation as capturing feelings that were roaming around in the mingled universe of those years. These poems are a fisherman’s net of the political, the romantic, the metaphysical, and something of history as it is lived. No poet writes their poetry alone. Not when there is suffering all around. The pen is moved by flowers and by pain, what Virgil called the tears of things. There are many kinds of poems in this book: love poems, reflections about life, poems about injustice. Writing for me is intrinsically poetic. And poetry is as much about what you find as what you make. I have found poetry in many unlikely places. For many, poetry is a vocation; for others, a rigorous daily craft. For me it is a destiny. The elegies of Africans can be as full of lamentation as of joy, as full of grief as of spiritual mysteries. They embrace the world. They Say They say Love grows When the fear of death Looms. They say Courage looms When the fear Of never loving again Disappears In the smell of the enemy Who crushes us so much We can only fight. Love and courage grow together When the flesh is rawest And the spirit charged And distorted within the nightmare We see the possibility Of a future. Zusammenfassung This moving poetry collection from the Booker Prize–winning author finds strength and hope while reflecting on the complex issues that have burdened Africa. First published in 1992, Ben Okri’s remarkable debut collection features poems that are now considered classics and taught in schools and universities worldwide. Here he plays with the mystique of the African continent, countering simplistic narratives of suffering that have been imposed on it with vibrant, nuanced portraits of the traditions and resilience of African peoples. An invaluable window onto Okri’s experiences as a Nigerian immigrant to the United Kingdom and as a writer discovering his calling, these poems also speak to universal truths about love, injustice, and the search for meaning....
