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Review: Six Basque Poets, ed. Mari Jose Olaziregi

Nick Holloway, Metro Life, 8.10.07

The British sometimes barely seem able to master their own language, let alone anyone else's. Obliged to reassemble their masterpieces in our lingo, poor foreign poets must be pulling their hair out, especially with no sign of it being a two-way street.

It's a tad presumptuous of us to say the least: to the Basque, whose language has survived ancient Rome and the meddling of General Franco, English is little more than a young upstart. Yet still they indulge us, and in doing so enliven our language with the idiomatic magic of their own.