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 | | The Best American Poetry 2007 (The Best American Poetry) by Heather McHugh (Editor), David Lehman (Editor) ISBN-10: 9780743299732 ISBN-10: 0-7432-9973-6 ISBN-13: 9780743299732 ISBN-13: 978-0-7432-9973-2 Paperback 2007-09-11 Scribner Find Lowest Price |
Editorials | ||
Product Description The twentieth edition of the Best American Poetry series celebrates the rich and fertile landscape of American poetry. Renowned poet Heather McHugh loves words and the unexpected places they take you; her own poetry elevates wordplay to a species of metaphysical wit. For this year's anthology McHugh has culled a spectacular group of poems reflecting her passion for language, her acumen, and her vivacious humor. Graced with McHugh's fascinating introduction, the book includes the poets' valuable comments on their work, as well as series editor David Lehman's engaging foreword that limns the necessity of poetry. The Best American Poetry 2007 is an exciting addition to a series committed to covering the American poetry scene and delivering great poems to a broad audience. | ||
Reviews | ||
Horrible I don't need to say anything else. Wish I could get my money and time back. | ||
Surface and depth I assisted a stoneworker once in the construction of a foundation. From a large pile of stones he was adept at quickly finding those which the wall required, the shape of substance equal to the shape of absence, soon filled. He said it was largely a matter of having scanned the available material and letting his unconscious mind direct him to a conscious, and mostly correct, choice. Of course, in using language, we do something similar, swiftly rummaging through the word hoard for the thing we wish to say, hoping it will be solid, and something to build on. Heather McHugh delves into the matter itself, its interstices, gaps, and echoes, and into the material of what we mean, and are often unconscious of. The effect can be disquieting, calling the solid into question, shaking the foundation. Attention and alertness are required to read her work, and they are also the reward. The fort in comfort falls, and sometimes, in the landscape that was blocked, the delight of uncertainty and insecurity is revealed, if we are willing to stand it. So I think McHugh selected poems for the Best American Poetry 2007 with something like this in mind. Are all of them best, or even better? Probably not. Some require more unraveling than I have patience for, some are indulgent, others seek to dazzle but tend to dizzy. That said, I have found the best way to read the book is here and there, now and then, to let accidents have their way with me. "Only surfaces interest me," writes Amit Majmudar in one of my favorite poems. "What depths I sound I sound by accident". But accidents, I think McHugh would agree, and the apparently random, favor the awakened mind. | ||
Some poems are interesting. Most are dull. There are a few poems in this book that are worth reading-- Milton Kessler's "Comma of God," for example-- but most of them are forgettable or nauseating. Some of the poems are so irritating or inept (or both) that you'll want to shove the book into the shredder. More irritating than the poems, though, is the section that contains the contributors' comments. Here's a sample by Thomas Fink: "By entertaining varied perspectives on interpersonal and intergroup conflict and by disrupting continuity between successive sentences, 'Yinglish Strophes IX,' I hope, foregrounds heterogeneous linguistic elements rather than an individual 'voiceprint.'" If that's your thing, go buy this book. | ||
Truly unimpressive I was incredibly disappointed in this work. The selection of poems as "best" in America in 2007 was stunning in its mediocrity, and even outright poverty. If these are truly the best poems in America, we really are in trouble. I have never written a review before but this terrible book just made me want to cry out in protest. | ||
a welcome addition to the series I've found many of the BAP series to be highly dissapointing. But it is hard to select a best of when it comes to poetry. It really depends on what you like to read. Now, there are some truly awful poems in here, and I'm not sure McHugh was the best choice as an editor, but she really picked some great poems. Sure about a quarter of them are awful, but most are readable or good. And then there are the great ones: Geffrey Brock, Galway Kinnell, Marya Rosenberg, David Shumate, Brian Turner, Charles Harper Webb and Joe Wenderoth. If you love poetry, you've gotta get this one. | ||