The Work of Poetry by John Hollander (PDF)

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New and classic essays by one of America’s most distinguished contemporary poet-critics, The Work of Poetry surveys an extraordinary range of poets, from Dante to May Swenson, and George Meredith to Marianne Moore, as well as works from the Psalms to A Child’s Garden of Verses. By turns generous and uncompromising, Hollander champions the enduring force of poetry against the incursion of fashionable writing. This is an elegant, uncompromising affirmation of the extraordinary powers of poetic imagination from a poet whose poems have been hailed by J.D. McClatchy as “ways of thinking on paper.”

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: From Library Journal Hollander (English, Yale), a recipient of the Bollingen Prize in 1983 and a five-year MacArthur Fellowship, has written a treatise on poetry that would never be considered easy reading. Of course, that was hardly his intent. Hollander instead aims at the understanding and appreciation of poetry, a goal he achieves by looking at, studying, and ultimately dissecting all that is poetry?and what pretends to be. The pretenders?work from certain literature programs and writing workshops and trendy writing from would-be poets lacking original thought, insight, and technical skill?do not fare well. Neither do some writers of free verse. As Hollander observes, free verse is very easy to write if one does not know how; good poets know how. Hollander’s discussion of good poets is not only enlightening, compelling, and demanding but also spiritual and caring. His views on Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Lewis Carroll, Marianne Moore, May Swenson, and particularly Walt Whitman certainly will move readers to a new level of comprehension, not only of the specific works but also of poetry itself. His book is, among other things, a critical response to poetry and, therefore, an exacting reading experience, but the rewards are diverse, as is the bounty. Highly recommended for serious literary collections.?Robert Kelly, Fort Wayne Community Schs., Ind.Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Kirkus Reviews Cautionary words about poetry from an idiosyncratic and surprising critic and poet. Hollander, usually regarded as a conservative observer of things poetic, both lives up to his reputation and defies it willingly in this essay collection. The Yale professor (and Bollingen Prize and MacArthur fellowship winner) predictably decries, for example, the dominance of creative-writing programs in contemporary America, blaming them in part for the rise of underachieving free verse and for an oversupply of poets who may not deserve the name. “Free verse . . . is very easy to write if you don’t know how,” he comments, convinced that many self-styled poets don’t. “Good poets know how,” he notes–as if we couldn’t figure that out for ourselves. At his best, Hollander abandons contempt and complaint in favor of real eloquence and mindfulness. For instance, his essays about poets May Swenson and Elizabeth Bishop are models of insight and stylistic clarity and tact. Anyone interested in poetry or criticism must read them. Hollander on Swenson: “Let words play with each other and they will do the imagination’s work. As she herself observed in the preface to a selection of her poems that she’d made for children and that highlights the matter of puzzle and riddle in all poetry: `Notice how a poet’s games are called his “works”–and how the “work” you do to solve a poem is really play. . . .’ Very, very good poetry does indeed make temporary poets of its readers, just as the inventiveness of poetry is itself so often a kind of interpretation.” Hollander’s comparisons and contrasts among poets are often beguiling, as in his consideration of Edgar Lee Masters, Robert Louis Stevenson, and the relationship between poetry and dreaming. His imagination is unpredictable and stimulating, especially when he does not assume too much about his audience’s familiarity with, or views on, poetry. He smites, he laments, but he also enlightens. — Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. Review Densely allusive, richly autobiographical, digressively informative, and crowned by brilliant close readings that are Hollander’s particular genius, these essays provide a crash course in poetry: what it has been, what it is, what it gives us when it is good, how poems work, what makes a poem masterful. — Daria Donnelly, CommonwealThis book shows Hollander at his best…. Hollander… displays in these essays an acute sensitivity to the special ways poetic language is organized and the manner in which such organization influences perceptions of reality. This kind of sensitivity enables the reader to share something of that attitude to language that, according to Hollander, characterizes the poet., Poetics TodayThese essays are more engrossing and rewarding, for me, than the readings of particular poets which close the volume. — Paul Dean, English StudiesFor me the great pleasure of Hollander’s book lies in his discussion of specific poems. — Ian Tromp, PN ReviewA critical response to poetry and, therefore, an exacting reading experience, but the rewards are diverse, as is the bounty., Library JournalScholars interested in Hollander will welcome this book as the celebration of a long and accomplished career., ChoiceFor every intelligent reader with a passion for poetry. — Frank KermodeIn some two dozen essays, the distinguished poet and Yale English professor Hollander explores poetry’s ‘pecularities, strangeness, ambiguities.’… Hollander’s criticism is rigorous, idiosyncratic, and often bracingly contrarian, the product of an acute poetic imagination and intelligence., Publishers Weekly Read more

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐I bought this book a few years back and I read it so often that my copy started to disentegrate. This isnt a complaint but a testament of how much I value Hollanders’ essays.Hollander is not a post modernist, but a solid traditional scholar and poet.He is an indispensible guide to poetry.

⭐In an age in which poetry is judged as a kind of mood music, this book will appear strange, maybe arcane, “academic,” or even hostile. However, this book is balm for anyone who knows what poetry really is. Hollander is among a handful of the best alive. His pedagogical skills and courtesies are enormous, and here carefully and generously deployed. Difficulties with this book are a function of the difficulties of poetry itself. Without which, as the doctor and poet WC Williams noted, men die miserably every day. Give it your best, and it will give you the best.

⭐Perhaps, if you have a Ph.D. in English, belong to the Modern Languages Association, and teach in a university where postmodernism is requisite, this is the book for you. I gave up half way through, finding these essays for the most part too rambling and self-referential – too “academic.” If you are not a professional academic but are curious about why and how poetry moves one, spend your money on Mary Oliver’s A Handbook of Poetry – half the price, half the length, and twenty times the useful information.

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