A Defense of Ardor

About this book

"Ardor, inspiration, the soul, the sublime : such terms have long since fallen from favor among critics and artists alike. In his new collection of essays, Adam Zagajewski continues his efforts to reclaim for art not just the terms but the scanted spiritual dimension of modern human existence that they describe." "Zagajewski's topics range from autobiography (his first visit to post-Soviet Lvov after childhood exile; his illicit readings of Nietzsche in Communist Poland); to considerations of artist friends past and present (Zbigniew Herbert, Czeslaw Milosz); to intellectual and psychological portraits of cities he has known, east and west; to a thumbnail sketch of postwar Polish poetry."--Jacket.