MODERN WOMAN

The trailblazing debut collection of Edith Södergran, a modernist visionary and one of the most influential poets to write in Swedish. Södergran’s daring, avant-garde work outraged many of her Finland-Swedish contemporaries who clung to traditional literary sensibilities. Through dynamic symbolism and fluid logic, the poems comprising her first collection fundamentally questioned early twentieth-century notions of what poetry is and what it can do. “Something like this has never been heard before,” noted critic and fellow Finland-Swedish poet Hagar Olsson about her work. During her short life, Södergran enacted the poet’s ultimate task of imagining previously unexplored possibilities for language, ushering literary modernism into Swedish-language writing and inspiring generations of writers since.

I love these poems and this book. The pairing of Eskilson with Södergran shows how much great poetic collaborations can achieve, across languages, cultures, and time. Eskilson’s care, attention, and respect for Södergran’s unique vision and style will bring so much joy and fascination to so many readers.—Jennifer Croft

Modern Woman is “a toast to women’s glory,” a young poet’s bold struggle to find a new language of self, gender, love, and home. These elegiac and ecstatic poems push the boundaries of societal and poetic convention, making way for a world where spring is a “cracked flute,” bliss is “wicked” and “pain gives us all we need.” This defiant debut collection is Edith Södergran’s message to the future, finally reaching us over a century later thanks to these deft, fresh-eyed translations by CD Eskilson. —Patty Crane

Like Ungaretti’s Il porto sepolto, published the same year, Södergran’s Dikter announced a radically new “outsider” lyric—formally groundbreaking, unflinchingly subjective, and destined to alter the course of European poetry. With Modern Woman, poet and translator CD Eskilson brings that audacious debut into exquisitely tuned English, and their translator’s introduction offers an insightful guide to her multilingual, avant-garde influences and the enduring force of her poetic “leap to freedom.” —Geoffrey Brock

It’s like falling in love; it defies description through mere words. It surpasses linguistic expression and embodies something greater. It’s pure magic. —Josef Ka