You With Hands More Innocent: Selected Poems of Vesna Parun

Vesna Parun was born in 1922 on the island of Zlarin, on the Dalmatian coast of Croatia. She made her literary debut in 1947 with the collection of poems, Zore i vihori (Dawns and Hurricanes), and over the next 60 years went on to publish more than twenty books of poetry, as well as essays, criticism, and children’s books. Although Croatian lyrical is a strong and fruitful tradition, until Vesna Parun there was not a single female poet with such developed sensibilities and poetic expressiveness: Parun’s modus vivendi was “it is love that makes and keeps us human.” And while there are many poets in Croatian literature who have written collections of love poetry, about love of a woman as an object, here we have poems about love with a woman as subject.

Dasha C. Nisula (translator) taught Russian and Croatian languages, literature, and culture. She is a translator of poetry and short stories from these languages, and the author of four books, numerous articles, reviews, and translations. Her work has appeared in An Anthology of South Slavic Literatures, and the literary journals Modern Poetry in Translation, Southwestern Review, International Poetry Review, and Massachusetts Review, among others. She is a member of the American Literary Translators Association, living and working in Kalamazoo, Michigan.