Mind-God & the Properties of Nitrogen

Fouad Gabriel Naffah (trans. Norma Cole)

First published in 1966, Lebanese poet Fouad Gabriel Naffah’s Mind-God and The Properties of Nitrogen charts the mind’s progress through the material world to the realm of pure spirit. Apprehended, the world survives as trace elements in the mind’s experience, in turn refined into concept and ideal, until all images fall away and the spirit frees itself. Crystalline, elusive, his poetry frustrates our tendency to consume form and meaning whole, without first appreciating the subtleties binding them more closely together. The book is illustrated by Irving Petling, who contributed five pastels for the cover and inserts.

Fouad Gabriel Naffah, one of the greatest Lebanese francophone poets, wrote two masterpieces: La description de l’homme, du cadre et de la lyre (1963), and L'Esprit-Dieu ou Les biens de l'azote (1966). The latter was his only book to appear in English. He died in 1983.