The Mays of Ventadorn

Two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning poet W.S. Merwin turns his mastery of language and powerful attention to the origins of twelfth-century Provençal troubadours. Merwin deftly blends personal anecdotes—his pilgrimage at the age of eighteen to visit Ezra Pound at St. Elizabeth’s Hospital, his purchase of an abandoned farmhouse in Quercy—with his exploration of Southern France’s rich history and linguistic heritage.