Citizens of Beauty

Now available in English for the first time, translated by the poet Jack Hirschman, this beautiful collection of poems by the Algerian poet Jean Senac (1926-1973) was originally published when he was forty-one. Senac represented the hope of the new generation of Algerians who were celebrating their independence from France after 130 years of colonialism, and in the tradition of Rene Char and the early Albert Camus, he portrayed an Algeria whose land and people would finally sing with their own voice. Senac celebrates revolution, love, and the body, beginning with the resonant verses: "And now we'll sing love / for there's no Revolution without love." He sang, as well, of beauty: "No morning without smiling. / Beauty on our lips is one continuous fruit."