The Grove of the Eumenides
New & Selected Poems
Will be published approx. on 20. November 2025
Book
Paperback/Softback
128 pages
978-1-78037-759-9 (ISBN)
Description
With The Grove of the Eumenides, the Lithuanian poet Tomas Venclova affirms his place as one of Europe's greatest living poets, the heir to Akhmatova, Mandelstam and Milosz. Venclova's masterful poetry upholds a vision of the world that enables us to endure the darkness of our time through his singular insights, ethical endurance and profound compassion. With classical grace, yet manifesting a deep commitment to remain a witness to the contemporary world, The Grove of the Eumenides is a collection of great wisdom.
Venclova's poetry addresses the desolate landscape of the aftermath of totalitarianism, as well as the ethical constants that allow for hope and perseverance. Bloodaxe published another selection of his poetry, The Junction, in 2008, bringing together new translations of his most recent work from that time as well as a selection of poems from his 1997 volume Winter Dialogue.
While The Junction covered poems written while he was still in Lithuania before his forced emigration - and poems from his first decades in the US dealing with exile - The Grove of the Eumenides addresses 'later life' issues of democracy, memory, climate, travel, ethics and ageing. There is no overlap between the two editions.
Venclova's poetry addresses the desolate landscape of the aftermath of totalitarianism, as well as the ethical constants that allow for hope and perseverance. Bloodaxe published another selection of his poetry, The Junction, in 2008, bringing together new translations of his most recent work from that time as well as a selection of poems from his 1997 volume Winter Dialogue.
While The Junction covered poems written while he was still in Lithuania before his forced emigration - and poems from his first decades in the US dealing with exile - The Grove of the Eumenides addresses 'later life' issues of democracy, memory, climate, travel, ethics and ageing. There is no overlap between the two editions.
Reviews / Votes
Venclova is a lyric poet of magisterial allure, committed to philosophical meditations...Part exile, part seer, he is the artist as witness and a living example of a literary elite that evolved in crisis yet remained true to the dictates of art. -- Eileen Battersby * The Irish Times * Every major poet has an idiosyncratic inner landscape against which his voice sounds in his mind... [Venclova's] landscape is that of the Baltic in winter, a monochromatic setting dominated by damp and cloudy hues - the light of the skies condensed into darkness. -- Joseph Brodsky If in Venclova's volume, Winter Dialogue, there is a concern with endurance, and a search for absolutes in the face of adverse conditions both in Lithuania and in exile, in his most recent work, The Junction, we find the figure of a poet returning from exile, surveying what has occurred, what buildings still stand, and the fates of those one loved. And while these poems are filled with melancholy at the passage of time, there is also a sense of affirmation. For despite everything, each element that is salvaged constitutes a form of victory - a testimony to all that can be, and is, preserved from the vicissitudes of History. -- Ellen HinseyMore details
Edition
Paperback original
Language
English
Place of publication
Tyne and Wear
United Kingdom
Product notice
Paperback (UK-trade)
Dimensions
Height: 234 mm
Width: 156 mm
Thickness: 9 mm
Weight
305 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-78037-759-9 (9781780377599)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
11/2025
Bloodaxe Books
€19.49
Available for download
Persons
Tomas Venclova was born in 1937 in Klaipeda, Lithuania. After graduating from Vilnius University, he travelled in the Eastern Bloc, where he met and translated Anna Akhmatova and Boris Pasternak. Venclova took part in the Lithuanian and Soviet dissident movements and was one of the five founding members of the Lithuanian Helsinki Group. His activities led to a ban on publishing, exile and the stripping of his Soviet citizenship in 1977. Venclova is Emeritus Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures at Yale University where he taught from 1985. He has been the recipient of numerous prizes including the Vilenica 1990 International Literary Prize, the Lithuanian National Prize in 2000, the 2002 Prize of Two Nations, which he received jointly with Czeslaw Milosz, the 2005 Jotvingiai Prize, and the New Culture of New Europe Prize, and the 2023 Zbigniew Herbert International Literary Award. His works include volumes of poetry, essays, literary biography, conversations and works on Vilnius. His poetry has been translated into English in Winter Dialogue (Northwestern University Press, 1997), The Junction: Selected Poems (Bloodaxe Books, 2008) and The Grove of the Eumenides (Bloodaxe Books, 2025). Magnetic North: Conversations with Tomas Venclova by Ellen Hinsey was published by University of Rochester Press and Boydell & Brewer in 2017. After many years in New Haven, Connecticut, and a period spent in Krakow, he returned to Lithuania and now lives in Vilnius.
Content
15 Ellen Hinsey: Tomas Venclova: Poetry of Witness and the Return of History
I
25 On Both Sides of Alnas Lake
27 To Master Radovan
29 Dictator
31 The Process of Beatification
33 Before the Fort
34 Azovstal
36 Flight
39 The Grove of the Eumenides
II
43 South of the Prospect
45 Chinese Impressions
54 Landscape with Polyphemus
55 Three Imperfect Sonnets
57 'The Stream of Smoke Dissolved in Yesterday's Air'
58 Prehistory
60 Cavalryman near Seinai
61 Beyond St Anne's and the Bernardines
63 Extra Urbem
66 Caligula at the Gates
III
69 August Elegy
71 Notes on Xenophon
74 Death of the Argonaut
76 'Tell me, what did you love? One city you left behind'
77 Mother of the Living
79 'It's not instantly clear why it comes up so rich'
81 From the Future
82 Kotor Sun
83 Eos
IV
87 Hamden, Connecticut
89 Hurricane
91 Three O'Clock at Night on the Sea
94 Syllabic Stanzas
96 The Moss of Ammassalik
98 'Leaving the subway with a pack on my back'
100 The Way to Planty Park, Krakow
102 Variation on the Theme of Awakening
104 Delft
105 To My Daughter
106 'Let the time you no longer remember'
109 Notes
113 Sources for poems
115 Selected bibliography
119 Translators
I
25 On Both Sides of Alnas Lake
27 To Master Radovan
29 Dictator
31 The Process of Beatification
33 Before the Fort
34 Azovstal
36 Flight
39 The Grove of the Eumenides
II
43 South of the Prospect
45 Chinese Impressions
54 Landscape with Polyphemus
55 Three Imperfect Sonnets
57 'The Stream of Smoke Dissolved in Yesterday's Air'
58 Prehistory
60 Cavalryman near Seinai
61 Beyond St Anne's and the Bernardines
63 Extra Urbem
66 Caligula at the Gates
III
69 August Elegy
71 Notes on Xenophon
74 Death of the Argonaut
76 'Tell me, what did you love? One city you left behind'
77 Mother of the Living
79 'It's not instantly clear why it comes up so rich'
81 From the Future
82 Kotor Sun
83 Eos
IV
87 Hamden, Connecticut
89 Hurricane
91 Three O'Clock at Night on the Sea
94 Syllabic Stanzas
96 The Moss of Ammassalik
98 'Leaving the subway with a pack on my back'
100 The Way to Planty Park, Krakow
102 Variation on the Theme of Awakening
104 Delft
105 To My Daughter
106 'Let the time you no longer remember'
109 Notes
113 Sources for poems
115 Selected bibliography
119 Translators