Thread: and Selected New York Poems

Many critical voices, in several languages, have praised the poet Vasyl Makhno. But in the case of this book such praise is only half of the golden apple. Without an excellent or, more precisely, a fully adequate translator, the poet’s name would be meaningless to most people, and a book of bad translations would distort his name. Makhno is very lucky to have found an adequate English-language translator. Orest Popovych, although (or, perhaps, because) he is a scientist by profession, is able to capture not only the text but also the subtext of this poetry. Never attempting, as some poet-translators do, to outsing the original song, Popovych attentively listens not only to he words but also to the melody and spirit of these poems long before putting pen to paper. As a result, those who do not have the Ukrainian language, may rest assured that they get the kernel of these powerful texts, and those who do will delight in the translator’s art. Bohdan Rubchak, Professor-Emeritus, University of Illinois at Chicago, bilingual poet and literary critic