The Book of Questions

A brilliant mixture of philosophical thoughts and fantasy. Every page provides some element of delight as it causes your mind to consider the world from a different angle and perspective. All of this and it is a translated work! How I wish I could read it as it was originally composed! I honestly think any person will find inside these covers a couplet which stops them in their metaphysical tracks and makes them go. 'I wonder...' How can you put a price on something like that? This kind of artistic brilliance definately represents some of humanities best features. Think I better stop now or people will think I'm winding them up!

I mean, absolutely always, but this one is one for the fans. It is not Neruda's selection (or Neruda's title). Not one to start with; get the Odes first.

One of his last manuscripts published posthumously. Enigmatic, humble, multi-faced poems as questions and best of all parallel text with the Spanish and lively translation. Beautifully produced book too.

I had seen an extract in something I was doing and this made me buy it - and it was good if not better than I had hoped for. Just a lovely source of simple reading with thought-provoking gems.

This is such a lovely book, meant to be looked at, read and appreciated everyday! It makes the perfect gift!

Throughout his writing life Pablo Neruda experimented with and used an extraordinary number of forms and covered a huge number of subjects.This short book, from the end of his life, shows this process continuing. The poems in this book are highly experimental, consisting solely of questions. They contain much of the vibrancy and life that is typical of much of Neruda's work. Each one of them is a surprise and sometimes a delight. Many are strange. There questions like:"To whom does the ragged condor/ report after its mission?"and"What did the tree learn from the earth/ to be able to talk with the sky?"Of course these may strike a reader as nonsensical, but that is the point. They are invitations to us to explore out imaginations, like Zen koans. And unlike some experimental poetry, they are very accessible. Indeed they are great funPossibly this is not to everyone's taste. Even though I enjoyed these enormously, I would agree they are not Neruda at his supreme best, but he is still pretty near. They do, however, show his astonishing creativity at work: a testament to how great a poet he was. For readers unfamiliar with his greatest poems might turn to one of the various selected poems (e.g  Selected Poems (Penguin Twentieth Century Classics) ) that are easily available. But that said, like his very best poetry, the ones in this volume may also transform the way you look at life. This is one from its physical size that you might carry in a pocket.

Philosophic-lite. Clever though, cannot be done again.