The poem of Queen Esther

This is a translation of a Spanish poem based on the biblical book of Esther. The author, Joao Pinto Delgado (c. 1585-1653), was born in Portugal and settled with his parents in Rouen, where he and his father were leading figures in the crypto-Jewish Marrano community. Delgado's choice of subject for this poem was not accidental; the murderous persecution of the biblical Jews by the Persian King Haman stands as an obvious analogue to their sufferings at the hands of the Inquisition. Today, it also resonates with the events of the Holocaust. At the same time, this virtually unknown work is an elegant piece of Renaissance writing that bears stylistic and thematic affinities to important poems of the English Renaissance, such as those of Spenser, Sidney, and Marlowe. Also included in this volume is a translation of Pinto Delgado's shorter poem In Praise of the Lord.