The Complete Perfectionist: A Poetics of Work

by Juan Ramón Jiménez, Juan Ram#243;n Jim

Few have written more memorably about the work of poetry and the poetics of work than Juan Ramón Jiménez, winner of a Nobel Prize and discerning teacher of an entire generation of Spanish poets. In this series of aphorisms, Jiménez brings together the elements of perfect work, both in writing and in other realms. Among these elements—the wellsprings of any kind of creation—are instinct and inspiration, memory and forgetting, silence and noise, love and regret.
A treasure for poets and writers, The Complete Perfectionist includes helpful commentary by noted translator Christopher Maurer and shows perfection as a process of “becoming” rather than an end product. In these insightful pages, a poet haunted by perfection reveals his methods of writing and revision, and measures the social and ethical dimensions of el trabajo gustoso , or pleasurable work. This revised and expanded edition includes many aphorisms recently published in Spanish and not previously included.

Genres: Poetry, Philosophy, Spanish Literature, Spain, Personal Development, Writing, Nonfiction

161 pages, Paperback

First published February 17, 1997

About the author

Platero y Yo (1914) ranks as most famous work of Spanish poet Juan Ramón Jiménez, who introduced modernism to Spanish verse and won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1956.

He won this prize "for his lyrical poetry, which in Spanish language constitutes an example of high spirit and artistical purity."

See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Ram...

Reviews

[Kirsten]

I loved this book--a collection of aphorisms from the over 4,000 the poet Juan Ramon Jimenez wrote down in his lifetime. They're organized under different headings like "Self," "Rhythm," and "Silence," and all have to do with the process of writing/living, which Jimenez was ever cogitating over. The title seems misleading to me--the "perfection" it gestures toward is not at all static and not so much related to an artistic product as to the process of creating-the continual reaching after an unobtainable ideal by throwing one's whole self into it.

Here was something unexpected--Jimenez's idea of memory as a hindrance to creating:

"My ideal would be 'to foreget and to make.' But I remember and remember and remember, and do not make."

"To forget is to be reborn."

"Ah, who could be as good at forgetting as remembering!"

(tee hee)

[Sarah]

Juan Ramón Jimenéz won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1956 for "his lyrical poetry, which in Spanish language constitutes an example of high spirit and artistical purity,” two years before he died. Jimenéz taught a generation of Spanish poets, and set out quite consciously with the goal of making Spanish poetry the most beautiful in the world. He spent six full decades writing.

His aphorisms exhibit a great striving and devotion to art, but can be dry, making Jimenéz sometimes seem like a poetic bureaucrat. And perhaps that’s what makes his poems so distilled and exquisite - the endless pursuit of perfection. It also makes him seem like a difficult character.

This book is broken into sections surrounding the topics Self, Rhythm, Silence, The Present, Memory, Ideals, Nature, Instinct, Dream, Death, Writing, Revision, Perfection. Each section includes an informative, short introduction by the book's editor with details on Jimenéz's life and work habits.

Jimenéz would not be one who believes “first draft, best draft.” He sought a balance between the free imagination (instinct) and the drive to revise (intelligence).

His best points are about silence and memory, silence being a wellspring in which to form your thoughts and develop your work undisturbed, and memory being rather ambiguous, that is, sometimes more a constraint than an inspiration. His best aphorism is - “To forget is to be reborn.”

Here are a few other favorites:

“When you’re working on one thing and start to yearn for another, imagine that this thing you’re working on would be the one you would yearn for if you were working on the other. (The Present)

“For remorse, there is no consolation.” (Memory)

“There are no better draftsmen than dust and shadows.” (Ideals)

And the one that seems to define his life:

“What does death matter if, in life and in work, we have conquered it day after day: if we have gone beyond it our thoughts and hearts?” (Death)

[Mike]

4 stars for the aphorisms; 3 stars for this edition. A collection of aphorisms from Jiménez framed around commentary by the translator, Christopher Maurer. Unfortunately, there is far too much of the translator’s commentary and not enough of Jiménez’s aphorisms. While the introduction was welcome, and it’s always great to have some critical footnotes, at least 60% of this book is Maurer’s thesis on the poet. Jiménez has written so much, but very little is translated into English, so why not just present his work and allow the reader the pleasure of interpreting the text? I wish an editor had trimmed these long introductory passages and placed the more essential commentary as footnotes. As it stands now, this book is more about the translator than the poet.

The aphorisms – what few we are given – are highly personal self-reflections that function as poems in their own right. The aphorism is often an unjustly overlooked stylistic form, and Jiménez shows us that they can be works of poetry as much as nuggets of philosophy or merely clever sayings. While the theme of the book is the work of the poet, the most memorable sections here are about dreams, death, and memory – or perhaps forgetfulness. If the beauty of perfectionism is the impossibility of being perfect, then the hallmark of memory is the necessary desire to forget. So also with dreams: “What a shame to awaken now, just as I was finding in the life of dream what I had lost in the dream of life.” Maybe that could be an apt description of poetry, too.

[sam]

A star intensely burning and intently becoming, enjoying itself and gaining nothing, a dream between ideas, a pure, a wonderfully useless defect in nature with long sensitive whiskers to sense the rough edges of the universe

[Marcus Gordon]

Very inspiring if you flirt with writing your own poetry. A gorgeous little book of aphorisms that takes you into the mind of a master.

[Rhys]

"No deep truth has ever been shouted."

[William Boutsakis]

complete perfectionist. rated 4/5 stars kehehehehe