EDMOND JABÈS died in Paris in 1991 at the age of 78. He settled in France after being expelled from his native Egypt with other Jews during the 1956 Suez Crisis. In 1987 he received France's National Grand Prize for Poetry. His other works available in English include The Book of Dialogue (1987), The Book of Resemblances in three volumes, and The Book of Questions issued in two volumes in 1991. ROSMARIE WALDROP's most recent books are a volume of poetry, Peculiar Motions (1990), and a novel, A Form / of Taking / It All (1990). Her translations of Jabès won a Columbia University Translation Center Award. RICHARD STAMELMAN is Professor of Romance Languages and Literature and William R. Jenan, Jr., Professor of Humanities at Wesleyan University.