HIRSCHMAN, Jack. Lyripol. San Francisco: City Lights Books. 1976.
Small 4to. Cream covers by Pamella Mosher with photograph of Jack Hirschman reading in Union Square at a rally; frontispice drawing by Kristen Wetterhahn; pp. [6], 9-98, [4]; minimal stains on back cover; near fine.
First edition.
Jack Hirschman writes in the "Note" preface of this City Lights compilation, "I know infact that every poem which follows was written by innumerable comrades who came through the skins of my translations and my graphic scrawls… I know, therefore, that Lyripol is not my or our book in the way posessive pronouns define property".
Regarded as a major communist poet, this quote perfectly encapsulates Hirschman's beliefs,who used his art to promote his consistent political values, remarking in Contemporary Authors: “It is vitally important at this time that all poets and artists collectivize and form strong socialist cadres in relation to working-class cultural internationalism.”
Hirschman was also a prolific translator who embarked in linguistic adventures in Russian, French, Yiddish, Vietnamese, Creole and more. He mostly elected to puruse works of radicalism which reflected his own politival devotion such as the Russian poet Vladimir Mayakovsky, who not only had ties to the Bolshevik uprising but which Hirschman considered reminiscent in affect of Ginsberg's Howl. Hirschman also translated the poems of a young Joseph Stalin into English.
It was at 19 years old that Jack Hirschman would write to Ernest Hemingway who replied, "I can't help you, kid. You write better than I did when I was 19. But the hell of it is, you write like me. That is no sin. But you won't get anywhere with it". Following Hemingway's suicide, his words would be published as "Letter to a Young Writer". Hirschman did go somewhere with it and Lyripol is a precious early example of his talent.
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