The little book of unsuspected subversion

The late Edmond Jabes was a major voice in French poetry in the latter half of this century. An Egyptian Jew, he was haunted by the question of place and the loss of place in relation to writing. He focused on the space of the book, seeing it as the true space in which exile and the promised land meet in poetry and in question. Jabes's unique mode of expression has been variously described: "a new and mysterious kind of literary work - as dazzling as it is difficult to define", "cascading aphorisms", "a theater of voices in a labyrinth of forms". The manner of his writing rigorously embodies the meaning of his writing. Jabes's book is a manifesto not only of his own poetry, but of the most advanced critical poetry written during this century, one in which he engages in dialogue with some of its outstanding philosophers (Blanchot, Levinas, and Derrida).