{"product_id":"ecstatic-pessimist-peter-dale-scott-9781538172438","title":"Ecstatic Pessimist: Czeslaw Milosz, Poet of Catastrophe and Hope","description":"\u003cp\u003eEcstatic Pessimist is a timely book about the Central and Eastern European experience of the mid 20th century, as told through the poetry and experiences of Czeslaw Milosz, Nobel Laureate for literature, who wrote on the horrors of war and the human experience. Written by a colleague and friend of the poet, it is part literary criticism and part memoir. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis biography\/memoir of Czeslaw Milosz is a first hand account of the poet's life and his relationship to the author, beginning in the 1960s. Milosz was a Polish-American poet, prose writer, translator, and diplomat. Regarded as one of the great poets of the 20th century, he won the 1980 Nobel Prize in Literature. In its citation, the Swedish Academy called Milosz a writer who \"voices man's exposed condition in a world of severe conflicts\".\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEcstatic Pessimist expands on Czeslaw Milosz's commitment to \"unpolitical politics\" - working for a revolution in culture, and above all poetry, as a necessary preparation for a revolution in politics.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis is a familiar notion in Poland, which for two centuries was politically divided, but poets preserved and enhanced a lively Polish consciousness, And, as the book shows, Milosz took steps over two decades to help reunite Poles in the successful Solidarity movement, whose struggle eventually changed the regime and forced the Soviet armies to withdraw.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBut the book is designed to encouraged a similar development in America. Milosz's ambition for poetry may at first sound exotic, but as the book says, it is in the spirit of what John Adams wrote late in life to Thomas Jefferson: \"The [American] revolution was in the mind of the people, and in the union of the colonies, both of which were accomplished before the hostilities commenced.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThough the book is also designed for those who already know and love Milosz, it is primarily written for those looking for someone whose genius could similarly inspire Americans of both left and right to unite in restoring the badly broken politics of this country.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe book argues that Czeslaw Milosz is that genius, as perhaps the only person who has been praised by intellectual leaders like Chris Hedges on the left, and has also spoken at Hillsdale College, the intellectual citadel of the American right.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Peter Dale Scott\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 1538172437\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9781538172438\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Rowman \u0026amp; Littlefield Publishers\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 02\/28\/2023\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 376\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.59lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 9.00h x 6.00w x 1.00d","brand":"Peter Dale Scott","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":44123084292351,"sku":"9781538172438","price":110.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_6566bd8b-9836-49d4-bf4d-51414d0ac4bf.jpg?v=1687428831","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/ecstatic-pessimist-peter-dale-scott-9781538172438","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}