The critic George P. Elliott once declared: "Hecht's voice is his own, but his language, more amply than that of any other living poet writing in English, derives from, adds to, is part of the great tradition."

The Darkness and the Light, Anthony Hecht's seventh volume – whose 44 poems include fine translations of poems by Horace, Baudelaire, Goethe, Vaillant and d'Orleans – vividly demonstrates that Elliott's claim is as apt now as it was when he made it, a quarter of a century ago.