From the troubadours of the Middle Ages to the titans of modern poetry, from Rabelais and Ronsard to Aimé Césaire and Yves Bonnefoy, offers English-speaking readers a one-volume introduction to a rich and varied tradition. Here are today’s rising stars mingling with the great writers of past centuries: La Fontaine, François Villon, Christine de Pizan, Marguerite de Navarre, Louise Labé, Baudelaire, Rimbaud, Verlaine, Mallarmé, Apollinaire, and many more. Here, too, are representatives of the modern francophone world, encompassing Lebanese, Tunisian, Senegalese, and Belgian poets, including such notable writers as Léopold Senghor, Vénus Khoury-Ghata, and Hédi Kaddour. Finally, this anthology showcases a wide range of the English language’s finest translators—including such renowned poet-translators as Ezra Pound, Marianne Moore, John Ashbery, and Derek Mahon—in a dazzling tribute to the splendors of French poetry.