tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-251920882012-04-15T19:34:53.873-04:00Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.comBlogger60125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-65912380523827469092009-05-31T19:07:00.000-04:002009-05-31T19:07:35.593-04:00

How a good idea turned into a great website--Poetry Daily.By Michael ChitwoodPoetry Media ServiceFor Don Selby, a good idea was born with a glance.In 1995, Selby was publishing law books. He had stepped into the office of colleague Diane Boller, and there on the shelf beside a book titled Liability of Corporate Officers and Directors was a very different sort of book, a collection of poems by W.S

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-31211828240249043302009-05-16T19:47:00.000-04:002009-05-16T19:47:16.548-04:00

Paul Muldoon's translation of Irish poet Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill's latest collection.By Carmine StarninoPoetry Media ServiceThe Fifty Minute Mermaid, by Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill. Tr. by Paul Muldoon. The Gallery Press.Hands up, anyone who knew that the merfolk's language was "pelagic"? I certainly didn't. Much remains unknown about these mythic creatures, and Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill's new book can help. A

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-69809644445965079472009-05-13T19:11:00.001-04:002009-05-13T19:16:40.808-04:00

German poet Durs Grünbein offers candid and chilling versions of history.By Helen VendlerPoetry Media ServiceAshes for Breakfast: Selected Poems, by Durs Grünbein. Translated by Michael Hofmann. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $16.00Although some poems by Durs Grünbein had been published in journals here and in England, it was not until the appearance of this volume, crisply and colloquially

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-31048604776554670552009-05-06T18:51:00.001-04:002009-05-07T18:52:30.999-04:00

A recollection of poet Howard Nemerov.By Eleanor WilnerPoetry Media ServiceA perennial problem with our poetry is that the journals, understandably, publish primarily the living, and some of our finest poets can easily get mislaid. A few of their poems may turn up in anthologies, but they disappear from the larger world of attention, something which creates at times the illusion that there are

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-44231573858323987632009-05-06T18:46:00.001-04:002009-05-06T18:53:46.841-04:00

Two new memoirs by poets Lavinia Greenlaw and Sarah Manguso.by Carla BlumenkranzPoetry Media ServiceThe Importance of Music to Girls, by Lavinia Greenlaw. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $23.00The Two Kinds of Decay, by Sarah Manguso. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $22.00Few writers are memoirists by profession, and it's hard to imagine what the qualifications might be. A compelling and even awful life

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-53578435998914601792009-05-04T19:26:00.000-04:002009-05-04T19:26:40.671-04:00

After early success, Robert Lowell strove for a new style--and revolutionized American letters.By Adam KirschPoetry Media ServiceEven before Robert Lowell published Life Studies, his masterpiece, in 1959, he was widely regarded as the best American poet of his generation. In his debut volume, the Pulitzer Prize-winning Lord Weary's Castle (1946), his combination of relentless rhythmic force and

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-29859773000877382752009-05-03T20:04:00.000-04:002009-05-03T20:04:39.542-04:00

Three newly discovered poems by Langston Hughes have their first known publication in the January 2009 issue of Poetry magazine.By Arnold RampersadPoetry Media ServiceLangston Hughes wrote these simple poems* in 1930, as the Great Depression loomed in America. By the end of 1933, in the depths of the crisis, he had composed some of the harshest political verse ever penned by an American. These

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-72811458104197276902009-05-02T08:21:00.000-04:002009-05-02T08:21:21.601-04:00

A close look at Elizabeth Bishop's poem "The Moose" shows why it took her twenty years to write it.By Toby EckertPoetry Media ServiceElizabeth Bishop claimed that it took her around 20 years to finish her poem "The Moose." Even for a poet as methodical as Bishop, that seems like an unusually long time. Taking up a theme she explored in poems such as "The Fish" and "The Armadillo," "The Moose"

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-15100649044099897152009-04-30T17:39:00.001-04:002009-04-30T17:41:52.120-04:00

A review of Davis McCombs's recent poetry collection.By Jason GurielPoetry Media ServiceDismal Rock, by Davis McCombs. Tupelo Press. $16.95.Younger poets still making a name for themselves, like Davis McCombs, know that they must be clear and compelling and not take up too much of our time--"for time," as August Kleinzahler smartly reminds us in a recent talk, "has vanished with inflated rents

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-40760732654669743152009-04-26T15:26:00.001-04:002009-04-26T16:38:06.228-04:00

Even the avant-garde couldn't resist Helen Adam's ballads.By Ange MlinkoPoetry Media ServiceA Helen Adam Reader, ed. by Kristen Prevallet. National Poetry Foundation. $29.95.The publication of A Helen Adam Reader is of historical interest, feminist interest--and poetic interest. Born in Peeblesshire, Scotland, in 1909, Adam was a teenage poet whose Victorian fairy ballads captivated the British

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-74188874453693960242009-04-24T19:33:00.001-04:002009-04-26T16:38:51.260-04:00

Sarah Hannah's second, and final, poetry collection.By Jason GurielPoetry Media ServiceInflorescence, by Sarah Hannah. Tupelo Press. $16.95.The author of this next book, a one-time nominee for Yale Younger Poet, committed suicide last year. Its poems are about flowers and mental health; they have titles like "Dried Flowers" and "Night Nurse," and brandish sharp lines likeDon't talk to me of Paris

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-81164514984714193892009-04-16T16:49:00.002-04:002009-04-26T16:41:07.852-04:00

Poet Stanley Plumly's book on the legendary John Keats transcends biography.By Eric OrmsbyPoetry Media ServicePosthumous Keats: A Personal Biography, by Stanley Plumly. Norton, $27.95.Poets who die young often have surprisingly lively posthumous careers. John Keats (1795-1821) provides the most celebrated example: Almost immediately after his death in Rome, at the age of 25, he entered the realm

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-73531918756699447662009-04-15T16:20:00.000-04:002009-04-15T16:20:24.920-04:00

Poet Albert Goldbarth discusses his 1950s space paraphernalia collection.By Richard SikenPoetry Media ServiceAlbert Goldbarth is the author of over 20 books of poetry, including, most recently, The Kitchen Sink: New and Selected Poems; his many honors include two National Book Critic Circle awards.Richard Siken: What do you collect?Albert Goldbarth: 1950s outer space stuffs, toy spaceships and

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-53366893619391150742009-04-13T21:00:00.000-04:002009-04-13T21:00:43.018-04:00

New U.S. Poet Laureate Kay Ryan.By Meghan O'RourkePoetry Media ServiceKay Ryan, who has just been named America's new poet laureate, is a miniaturist. She favors compression the way Walt Whitman favored expansion. Like oysters, she has said, her poems take shape around "an aggravation." They are also small (most are only about 20 lines long), rich, and dense. A single one might not always make a

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-84810712402588523422009-04-08T20:03:00.001-04:002009-04-08T20:03:50.357-04:00

The reverent, and irreverent, poetry of Zen priest Philip Whalen.by Travis NicholsPoetry Media ServiceIn his book Zen and the Birds of Appetite (New Directions, 1968), Thomas Merton compares the true Zen artist's mind to a mirror, a reflective surface that does not strive for meaning or poetic beauty. He quotes Zenkei Shibayama:The mirror is thoroughly egoless and mindless. If a flower comes it

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-63175568342883856242009-04-07T21:17:00.000-04:002009-04-07T21:17:49.671-04:00

The delightful verse of new Children's Poet Laureate Mary Ann Hoberman has been a family favorite for decades.By Michael AtkinsonPoetry Media ServiceThe best children's poets look at the subjects most parents are terrified of introducing to their little children--death, for instance--and invite them, gracefully, to dance. Take, for instance, Mary Ann Hoberman's "Mayfly," a rather Williamseque

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-27176022582593517932009-04-05T21:16:00.000-04:002009-04-05T21:16:31.563-04:00

Tips for homeschoolers, and all parents, on inspiring families with verse.By Susan ThomsenPoetry Media ServiceWhen she was a tiny girl, one of Karen Edmisten's daughters took a shine to Emily Dickinson. Edmisten, a freelance writer and homeschooling mom in the Midwest, recently recalled what it was like to hear a poetry-besotted four-year-old reciting the Belle of Amherst:Because I could not stop

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-2481836383613027382009-04-03T20:56:00.000-04:002009-04-03T20:56:55.330-04:00

W.S. Di Piero reminisces.By W.S. Di PieroPoetry Media ServiceON THE PORCHI went to find the poet Hayden Carruth when I was living in Vermont in the mid-seventies and he was running his small farmstead, patching together a living with literary hackwork, haying, tractor repair, barn-building, and any other money-eking enterprise, on a hill outside Johnson about forty miles from me. When I phoned in

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-52021312791982363152009-04-02T19:07:00.000-04:002009-04-02T19:07:42.125-04:00

The rift of war between poets Robert Duncan and Denise Levertov.By Ange MlinkoPoetry Media ServiceOne day in early September 1966, the poet Robert Duncan, then 47, was walking to a streetcar stop in San Francisco when lines of verse began drifting to him out of nowhere. These poems would appear toward the end of what may be Duncan's finest book, Bending the Bow (1968), which was written largely

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-1164646525562494142009-03-31T21:43:00.000-04:002009-03-31T21:44:19.194-04:00

Gilbert Wesley Purdy has been reviewing books and other items on the Internet and in paper venues for several years now. As regards books, he reviews both poetry and topical non-fiction prose. Should the texts be translations from a romance language, and the original texts be available to him, he may also choose to review the quality of the translation.At present, he is a regular reviewer for the

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-69228290520730894052009-03-31T21:34:00.003-04:002009-04-26T16:41:46.517-04:00

With his first book Don't Bump the Glump, Shel Silverstein made the leap from Playboy cartoonist to children's author.by Jesse NathanPoetry Media ServiceDon't Bump the Glump! And Other Fantasies, by Shel Silverstein. HarperCollins, $17.99.In 1956, the young Sheldon Alan Silverstein dropped off a portfolio of about 15 drawings at the offices of an upstart publication called Playboy, then located

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-18240602098316842842009-03-29T18:17:00.002-04:002009-04-26T16:42:31.640-04:00

Richard Kenney's first poetry collection in fifteen years is worth the wait.by D. H. TracyPoetry Media ServiceThe One-Strand River, by Richard Kenney. Alfred A. Knopf. $26.95.Fifteen years have passed since Kenney's last book, and The One-Strand River finds the author having deviated some from his last known trajectory. After The Invention of the Zero (1993), I would have guessed Kenney's poems

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-1158273860613390882009-03-17T14:14:00.000-04:002009-03-17T14:15:10.886-04:00

Percy Bysshe Shelley (August 4, 1792 - July 8, 1822)Poetry:"Adonais: An Elegy on the Death of John Keats" (U. Toronto);"Alastor: Or, the Spirit of Solitude" (Bartleby.com);The Complete Poetical Works, Oxford 1914 (The University of Adelaide Library);"Feelings Of A Republican On The Fall Of Bonaparte" (Poem Hunter);"Julian and Maddalo: A Conversation" (Bartleby.com);"Love's Philosophy" (The Bralyn

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-1161976145635631172009-03-17T14:13:00.000-04:002009-03-17T14:13:31.913-04:00

John Keats was born in London, October 29, 1795, in the house of his grandfather, who kept a livery stable at Moorfields. He received his education at Enfield, and in his fifteenth year was apprenticed to a surgeon. Most of his time, however, was devoted to the cultivation of his literary talents, which were early conspicuous. During his apprenticeship, he made and carefully wrote out a literal

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25192088.post-11099602691321585992009-02-12T19:48:00.000-05:002009-02-12T19:48:29.665-05:00

Matthea Harvey discusses the futuristic imagery of her latest poetry collection.By Jeannine Hall GaileyPoetry Media ServiceMatthea Harvey's latest book, Modern Life, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, is obsessed with devastated worlds and hybrid forms of life. In two extended abecedarian sequences, the "Terror of the Future" and "The Future of Terror," Harvey explores the

Gilbert Wesley Purdyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612678869556343487noreply@blogger.com0