The Figure Outward by Jean Daive translated by Kevin Holden

$20.00

A major work by one of France’s great poets, The Figure Outward (L’énonciateur des extrêmes) consists of one unfolding, translucent poem, both minimal and capacious, that devotes itself to a rigorous examination of both ancient and modern worlds. Known for his close connection to the poets and poetics of Objectivism, here Jean Daive engages rather with the voices of Black Mountain, extending a conversation between Charles Olson and Robert Creeley — whose work and whose correspondence function almost as characters within Daive’s poem — an exchange that began in Mayan Letters and continued across the span of their friendship. Ranging in tone and reference, fracturing and recombining along axes of intricate attention and personal obligation, Daive’s book is “set” in Mesoamerica, where it encounters conflicts and harmonies between sustenance, desire, and ritual, the origins of writing, the origins of money, and the ecosystems of both animal and cultural worlds. At once an archeology of deep time and in dialogue with the contemporary concerns of experimental American and French poetics, The Figure Outward also seeks to create a futurity: a new site and a new syntax for the particularities of perception, for empathy, friendship, and ethics, and for the cognition of history in its multiplicity. Elusive and lucid, primordial and precise, the book startles the reader with its innovation and sparkles in its intelligence, dedication, and sweep.

A major work by one of France’s great poets, The Figure Outward (L’énonciateur des extrêmes) consists of one unfolding, translucent poem, both minimal and capacious, that devotes itself to a rigorous examination of both ancient and modern worlds. Known for his close connection to the poets and poetics of Objectivism, here Jean Daive engages rather with the voices of Black Mountain, extending a conversation between Charles Olson and Robert Creeley — whose work and whose correspondence function almost as characters within Daive’s poem — an exchange that began in Mayan Letters and continued across the span of their friendship. Ranging in tone and reference, fracturing and recombining along axes of intricate attention and personal obligation, Daive’s book is “set” in Mesoamerica, where it encounters conflicts and harmonies between sustenance, desire, and ritual, the origins of writing, the origins of money, and the ecosystems of both animal and cultural worlds. At once an archeology of deep time and in dialogue with the contemporary concerns of experimental American and French poetics, The Figure Outward also seeks to create a futurity: a new site and a new syntax for the particularities of perception, for empathy, friendship, and ethics, and for the cognition of history in its multiplicity. Elusive and lucid, primordial and precise, the book startles the reader with its innovation and sparkles in its intelligence, dedication, and sweep.

About the Author:

Jean Daive is the author of over thirty collections of poetry, novels, and inter-genre texts. He has edited encyclopedias, worked as a radio journalist and producer for France Culture, and has founded and edited several magazines. His first book, Décimale blanche was translated into German by Paul Celan and into English by Cid Corman. Publishing since the 1960s and considered one of the most important poets of the French avant-garde, Daive’s work is a deep and elliptical investigation alternating between lyric, narration, and reflective prose. He is also a translator of work by Paul Celan, Robert Creeley, and several others.

About the Translator:

Kevin Holden is a poet, translator, and essayist. He is the author of seven books and chapbooks of poetry, including Solar, which was a finalist for the National Poetry Series and won the Fence Modern Poets Prize, Birch, which won the Ahsahta Press Award, and Pink Noise, recently out from Nightboat Books. His work has appeared in publications such as Conjunctions, Denver Quarterly, Lana Turner, and The New Yorker, and in several anthologies, including Best American Experimental Writing (Omnidawn) and If Bees Are Few (Minnesota). He translates from French, German, and Russian and has taught at Bard, Harvard, and Iowa. He is a Junior Fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows and is the Writer-in-Residence of Kirkland House. He is also an activist and cares a great deal about trees.