The Selected Poems of Cavafy

Aug 16, 2025 8:14 AM

Author:C. P. Cavafy,Avi Sharon,Avi Sharon

C. P. Cavafy is one of the most singular and poignant voices of twentieth-century European poetry, conjuring a magical interior world through lyrical evocations of remembered passions, imagined monologues and dramatic retellings of his native Alexandria's ancient past. Figures from antiquity speak with telling interruptions from the author in such poems as 'Anna Comnena' and 'You did not understand', while precise moments of history are seen with a sense of foreboding, as in 'Ides of March', 'The God Abandoning Antony' and 'Nero's Deadline'. And in poems that draw on his own life and surroundings, Cavafy recalls illicit trysts or glimpses of beautiful young men in 'One Night', 'I have gazed so much' and 'The Café Entrance', and creates exquisite miniatures of everyday life in 'An Old Man' and 'Of the Shop'.

Winner of the prestigious Harold Morton Landon Translation Award 2009

Reviews

The Everyman edition promises to be a splendid celebration of the divine Plum

—— The Independent

The handsome bindings are only the cherry on top of what is already a cake without compare

—— The Evening Standard

He exhausts superlatives

—— Stephen Fry

Richly satisfying

—— Evening Standard

Coetzee the critic is every bit as good as Coetzee the novelist.

—— Irish Times

The chaotic tale of the hapless Lucy will strike a chord with any woman who hasn't quite mastered the art of being a domestic goddess

—— Instyle UK

An hilarious read

—— Sainsbury’s Magazine

Perfect for failed domestic goddesses everywhere

—— heat

Smart, funny, and well-observed...a must read for any woman who loves to laugh at the often unintentional humor in domestic life

—— Karen Quinn, bestselling author of The Ivy Chronicles

The latest literary sensation

—— The Sun

Neill bucks the chick-lit trend with prose that's clever and endearing, and frazzled parents will love the way she nails the sticky, hair-pulling mania of domestic life

—— Washington Post

A deftly executed domestic comedy

—— Boston Globe

Hilarious . . . Plays with the chaos and comedy of 30-something metropolitan maternity and brings it to an unexpectedly moving conclusion

—— Anna Wintour , Vogue

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