Defenses of poetry have been around almost as long as poetry itself. Both rarely have much effect on the real world—the world outside of poems, in which wars are fought, people die, and ideals are tarnished. Perhaps, suggests Milosz, the blame lies partly with the poets themselves. Perhaps they and those who defend their craft have grown afraid of reality, afraid to see it clearly and speak about it in words we can all comprehend. (pp. 58-9)

[Milosz] speaks in The Witness of Poetry with the sort of quiet, preeminent brilliance that makes his defense … a classic for our time…. Milosz works outward from the facts of his life—his provincial origins, his classical and Catholic education, his experience in Poland during the catastrophic years of World War II—to explain why true poetry is and always has been "the passionate pursuit of the Real."

Milosz's chief...