Dark Night by John of the Cross, translated by Martha Sprackland PRE-ORDER
Poetry Book Society Translation Choice Summer 2026
Penguin
Published 21 May 2026
‘O living flame of love,
how tenderly you scorch me’
The poetry of the sixteenth-century Spanish mystic, John of the Cross, has inspired and consoled for hundreds of years, influencing writers from James Joyce to Seamus Heaney, Geoffrey Hill to T.S. Eliot and Mary Oppen. This new edition of his essential works, in a sensitive and luminous translation by Martha Sprackland, gathers John of the Cross’s complete poems and a selection of his prose, including from his extended commentary on the poem ‘Dark Night’.
In his immediate, sensual writing, we see a soul searching for meaning and union with the divine: both meek and bold, deserving and undeserving, oscillating between light and dark, soaring and falling, desperation and salvation. Dark Night gives us a picture of faith at once confronting and inspiriting, and of the power of words as a means of spiritual transcendence.
Translated by Martha Sprackland, with an introduction by Colin Thompson.
MEMBERS ENJOY 25% OFF ALL POETRY BOOKS
Join the Poetry Book Society for 25% off all books
Join the Poetry Book Society for 25% off all books