MLR, IOI.2, 2oo6 563 the death of the Christian Messiah, Mary and the Virgin Birth. A further series of objections is raised by the Jew in sections iII-xIII, of which perhaps the most interesting concerns the Christian reverence for images and the Jewish abomination of idolatry. Given all this, and the perspective from which the modern reader is bound to approach it, one could be forgiven for thinking that ithas little to offer. But that would be too hasty a judgement. I felt more sympathy with the Jew in terms of exegesis and argument, which shows how far the nature of the debate has shifted. The Christian takes the view that philosophy has no place in the discussion of religious truth, which depends on revelation, an attitude that seems eccentric a century after the death of Aquinas, whereas the Jew resists believing anything that goes against reason. A more positive note is struck at the end, where the Christian at least has the grace to point to areas of doctrinal agreement between Christians and Moors (though this too is turned against his opponent). ST CATHERINE'SCOLLEGE, OXFORD COLINTHOMPSON La idea del lenguaje en la poesia espaniola: Crespo, Stanchez Robayna y Valente. By ARTHUR TERRY. Santiago de Compostela: Servicio de Publicaciones Universidad de Santiago de Compostela. 2002. I50 pp. Ei 8.03. ISBN 84-812I-974-6. This volume gathers together in three chapters and an introduction the lectures that the lateArthur Terry gave inNovember 20oo at the University of Santiago de Compostela in the context of his inauguration as the first Jose Angel Valente Profes sor of Poetry and Aesthetics. The theme chosen for these inaugural lectures was an appropriately key one for all scholars and students of poetry: the concern of poets with the theme of language itself. As anyone familiar with the subject will know, this concern is not peculiar to the set of contemporary Spanish poets considered here, namely Angel Crespo, Andres Sanchez Robayna, and Jose Angel Valente, however idiosyncratic their approaches to the theme of language may be. Indeed, throughout his work, Terry, while avoiding the unnecessary detail that a systematic overview of metapoetry since the late nineteenth century (or even earlier) might have involved, evokes in rather more succinct and elegant terms just how these poets follow in a tra dition of self-conscious investigation towhich they are indebted and also contribute. Avoiding either patronizing scholars in the field or alienating the uninitiated, the author begins by producing a clear and concise introduction to critical thought on, and literary responses to, the problematic relationship between language, self, and the world of objects, citing in the process Derrida, Foucault, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty, and the Spanish poets Machado and Guillen, aswell asValente and Sanchez Robayna themselves. He explains that three factors combine in any poem: consciousness, the world of objects, and, of course, language. He suggests that what is characteristic of modern poetry is that it ismarked by an absence of any fixed notion of either the self-the 'I'-or reality itself. Consequently, the location and function of language are rendered unstable (p. I8). Terry then goes on to demonstrate in the three chapters de voted toCrespo, Sanchez Robayna, and Valente respectively how these poets, against the background of an acute awareness of the referential limitations of language, en deavour, as he puts it in his introduction, to reduce the space separating things from words, or at least indicate the nature of that space and its consequences for poetic language (p. I7). The themes articulated in the treatment of each poet are often fami liar ones (the world as text, transcendentalism, uttering the ineffable, the sacredness of poetry, poetry as revelation and mystical experience), as are the influences and intertexts (Dante, G6ngora, Mallarme, San Juan de laCruz). Yet what Terry does 564 Reviews extremely well is to provide an outline of the development of the theme of language across the respective ceuvres of the three poets in question while, at the same time, still managing to provide numerous close readings of whole poems (or of extracts) by way of concrete example. All in all, this volume provides an excellent introduction to the theme of...
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Oct 17, 2023
Macarena Sánchez-Izquierdo + 1
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