We have received the sad news of the death of Claude Esteban, the first ever poet, rather than a novelist, to win the Prix Goncourt for Poetry. The Irish poet, John Montague, translated a sequence of Esteban’s loosely based on King Lear: A Smile Between the Stones (Sur La Dernière Lande), and this was published by Agenda Editions with a grant from the Arts Council of Ireland in 2005. Copies (£7.99) each are available from The Wheelwrights, Fletching Street, Mayfield, East Sussex TN20 6TL.
John Montague sent the following poem as an epitaph for his friend, Claude Esteban: From SOMEONE BEGINS TO SPEAK IN A ROOM
When one has suffered too long, one should
pause sometimes, and laugh a little, and share
with friends some sweet cake since one is drinking
sweet wine from the Canaries and let there be dances
even a shade wanton, so once spoke a fool
to distract his master who did not mend
or who did not wish to mend from his malady,
I know others like that.