A Year of Mourning: Poems 271-322 of Petrarch’s Rerum Vulgarium Fragmenta

Poetry. Translated by Lee Harlin Bahan. Lee Harlin Bahan delves into the crowded field of Petrarch translations and delivers a classical offering with a postmodern- cool facelift. A YEAR OF MOURNING is daring, quirky, and playful, but with traditional trimmings. The expected classical and Biblical references abound, but also vivid allusions to pop culture and the contemporary social scene, including Madonna, Robert Frost, rock ‘n’ roll, even the Walnettos caramel- walnut candy. This is the Petrarch you know alongside the Petrarch you’ve never experienced before. This is a Petrarch translation not to be missed._x000D_
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“Lee Bahan has undertaken a seemingly Herculean task, to translate a group of Petrarch’s sonnets while eliminating almost everything we associate with the word ‘Petrarchan’; it’s as if her template is a cross between Shakespeare’s ‘My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun’ sonnet, and the lyrics of a particularly annoyed and upset country singer. This is emphatically not our grandmother