Yannis Ritsos's output since his first published book in 1934 has been almost exclusively poetic. His latest book, "Studies," a selection of six essays written between 1961 and 1963 and originally included as introductions to other works, is his only work of criticism. These essays—four on poets (Mayakovsky, Hikmet, Ehrenburg, Éluard) and two shorter ones on his own works….—comprise the only theoretical writings published by Ritsos on his art. For this reason "Studies" is one of the most important works in Ritsos's oeuvre.

Ritsos finds the importance of the four leftist poets he is studying in the message of their poetry and not in their technique or style. Concerned that a poet may limit himself too strictly to his own times, Ritsos defends the need of his subjects to root among temporal materials for the very backbone of their work and finds in the immediate present and in material...