Miklavž Komelj is one of Slovenia’s leading intellectuals—a poet, artist, writer, art historian, and translator—who shares his wide-ranging interests and probing mind in this second collection to appear in English. A voracious reader, he peppers his work with allusions from literature, mythology, and history, but his inspiration also comes from less likely places, like a literary tattoo on the wrist of a woman sitting near him on a bus. Here are love lyrics, political polemics, mystical verses, artistic and archival explorations, epigrammatic and philosophical poems, and long free verse experiments. With poems spanning thirty years of his career, Night Is More Abstract illuminates the breadth and richness of Komelj’s vision and his country. The book is bilingual on facing pages.

Miklavž Komelj is one of Slovenia’s leading intellectuals—a poet, artist, writer, art historian, and translator—who shares his wide-ranging interests and probing mind in this second collection to appear in English. A voracious reader, he peppers his work with allusions from literature, mythology, and history, but his inspiration also comes from less likely places, like a literary tattoo on the wrist of a woman sitting near him on a bus. Here are love lyrics, political polemics, mystical verses, artistic and archival explorations, epigrammatic and philosophical poems, and long free verse experiments. With poems spanning thirty years of his career, Night Is More Abstract illuminates the breadth and richness of Komelj’s vision and his country. The book is bilingual on facing pages.