cover image The Poetry of Petrarch

The Poetry of Petrarch

Francesco Petrarca. Farrar Straus Giroux, $30 (277pp) ISBN 978-0-374-23532-1

All 366 of the Canzoniere are available in The Poetry of Petrarch, an English-only edition by poet and translator David Young (At the White Window), who also introduces the book. Petrarch (1304-1374) spent 47 years crafting, mostly in sonnets, what may be the ultimate evidence that a love (here, for ""Laura"") that is thwarted in flesh can come to fruition in word: ""Love spurs me on and reins me in at once,/ comforts and terrifies, burns and freezes me,/ is kind, then scorns me, summons and dismisses, thrills me with hope, then fills me up with sorrow.""