Stranger Music
Selected Poems and Songs
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- $19.99
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- $19.99
Publisher Description
Leonard Cohen's legacy is that of one of the most literate, daring, and affecting poet-songwriters in the world. Stranger Music presents a magnificent cross-section of Cohen's work - including the legendary songs 'Suzanne', 'Joan of Arc' and 'The Chelsea Hotel', and elections from such books as Flowers for Hitler, Beautiful Losers, and Death of a Lady's Man, and eleven previously unpublished poems.
Stranger Music brings together Cohen's song lyrics and a generous selection of his poetry and is a celebration of the legendary musician's extraordinary gift for language that speaks with rare clarity, passion and timelessness.
'A massive record of the poet's imaginative journey, through beauty, through horror, through the extremes of love and despair, from the deepest abyss of self-abnegation to the rare and necessary moments of ecstasy. The language ranges from the exquisitely beautiful to the darkly obscene, from the romantically inspired to the ironically banal... A poetic record like no other' Toronto Star
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Cohen is probably best known as the writer of the lyrics for the song ``Suzanne,'' made famous by Judy Collins, but has written a great many other songs, too, as well as poetry and prose poetry not set to music. In reading through this generous selection, one often hears the ghost of musical accompaniment, and sometimes its actual presence is missed. The writing alone, forthright in its rhythms, plain of speech, often rhymed, and almost immediately accessible, seems well suited to the ears of a live audience. So fans of the songs will be in luck, here; but readers who prefer slow subtleties, or a kind of poetry that gradually expands in meaning on rereading, or ambitious craft, won't find it in a piece like ``For Anne,'' which begins ``With Annie gone, / Whose eyes to compare / With the morning sun?'' Cohen's writing is oral in flavor, and asks us to ``read'' it mainly by hearing it. This works to the disadvantage of a book, where words stay put and aren't sung.
