Maxine Kumin

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She is so depressing
"Originality is important..."
You Wanna Know About Old School Confessional Poetry?
superior poetry
forcefull & fragile

The Complete Poems: Anne Sexton
Anne Sexton
Manufacturer: Mariner Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Anne Sexton: A Self-Portrait in Letters

ASIN: 0395957761

Amazon.com

She drew her poems from a great depth in herself, and they continue to stir us...Her voice remains a distinctive one in American poetry of the past half century. -- J.D. McClatchy

Book Description

From the joy and anguish of her own experience, Sexton fashioned poems that told truths about the inner lives of men and women. This book comprises Sexton's ten volumes of verse, including the Pulitzer Prize-winner Live or Die, as well as seven poems form her last years.

Customer Reviews:

She is so depressing.......2007-05-12

I love Anne Sexton, but really, one can only take her a little at a time. Having read her bio and her daughters book, "To Mercy Street and Back" I had to have her complete works. Here is a woman who is stark raving mad, incests her daughter, and is still a great writer, but even my dark side says "too much". I can't read too much at a time. Still, i'm glad to have it in my library. It is amazint too me how much medication her doctors kept her on, on had an affair with her, one sold her tapes, supposedly confidential information. I feel a great deal of empathy and pity for this woman, oh she also had a husband who liked to use her as a punching bag and a mother in law that took over her household she lived with a bunch of enablers, without which she might never have become a writer, but maybe would have had a chance at life. A true American tragedy of a woman abused in every way, but still a genius.

"Originality is important...".......2006-05-14

The Complete Poems by gifted poet Anne Sexton is my favorite book of poetry. Sexton suffered from repeated periods of depression and attempted suicides, unfortantely this talented woman could not overcome her inner-demons, she took her life in 1974. The first poem I ever read by Sexton was The Abortion: "Somebody who should have been born is gone/just as the earth puckered its mouth/each bud puffing out from its knot/I changed my shoes and then drove south." Some of the other poems I love are The Wifebeater, Mr. Mine, In the Deep Museum, Killing the Spring, Man and Wife, and Imitations of Drowning. I have always enjoyed her most personal poems such as The Double Image: "I lived like an angry guest/like a partly mended thing/an outgrown child/I remember my mother did her best/she took me to Boston and had my hair restyled/your smile is like your mother's the artist said/I didn't seem to care/I had my portrait done instead." The first poem in the book is You, Doctor Martin: "Your business is people/you call at the madhouse/an oracular eye in our nest/out in the hall the intercom pages you/you twist in the pull of the foxy children who fall like floods of life in frost." Sexton also wrote beautiful love poems like the poem Eighteen Days Without You: "Swift boomerang, come get!/I am delicate/you've been gone/the losing has hurt me some, yet I must bend for you/see me arch, I'm turned on/my eyes are lawn-colored, my hair brunette." There are so many fabulous and haunting poems by Sexton, I highly recommend buying this collection, she was a real writer.

You Wanna Know About Old School Confessional Poetry?.......2006-02-28

In a nutshell, Anne Sexton is the second coming of Christ...and this is coming from an Atheist...if you dig Kim Addonizio, Maxine Kumin, or Denise Duhamel, pick up this definitive collection of Sexton's work and be prepared to be floored by one of the originators of the confessional school. Long before feminist revisionist mythmaking was a catch-phrase, Sexton was turning the Brothers Grimm on their heads...enjoy.

superior poetry.......2006-01-27

Oddly enough, I find Sexton's disturbing nature to be almost soothing in her poetry. Like Plath, her history of mental illness makes for a sad life but amazing poetry.

forcefull & fragile.......2005-09-22

Ann Sexton tried hard to liberate herself and stand tall in a male dominated society.
Her work is direct, without compromises and hits you hard where poetry should hit; in your heart. This beautifull book tells it all from the early work to the last bits, before she ended a life that looks like a brilliant career but must have been a struglle and extremely painfull proces of trying and trying again.
After reading this I can only be convinced that Ann and Sylvia Plath belong, or should belong, to the most influentual poets of the past decade.

The Autumn House Anthology of Contemporary American Poetry

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A major offering that is sure to delight

The Autumn House Anthology of Contemporary American Poetry
Sue Ellen Thompson
Manufacturer: Autumn House Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Donkey Gospel: Poems
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ASIN: 1932870067
Release Date: 2005-09-30

Product Description

The Autumn House Anthology of Contemporary Poetry is an exciting collection of work from more than ninety of the best poets writing today including Phillip Levine, Rita Dove, Stephen Dunn, Jean Valentine, Gerald Stern, Maxine Kumin, Tony Hoagland, Denise Duhamel, Nick Flynn, Jo McDougall, Tim Seibles and many others. The volume includes a full-page photograph and short biography of each poet.

Customer Reviews:

A major offering that is sure to delight.......2005-10-15

This is a wonderful collection of poetry that would be ideal for someone wanting to sample poetry or perhaps give as a gift. There is something in the 300 plus poems by 94 of America's best poets that will appeal to virtually any reader remotely interested in poetry. The reader can sample the works of both well known poets like Philip Levine, Ruth L. Schwartz, and Billy Collins as well as lesser known but highly regarded one's such as Tracy K. Smith, Nick Flynn, and Joy Katz. The subjects addressed run the gambit from love, desire, death, and family relationships to a host of other offerings that make this a literal poetry feast of some of the best of the best in contemporary American poetry. A major offering that is sure to delight.

Mites to Mastodons: A Book of Animal Poems

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Mites to Mastodons: A Book of Animal Poems
Maxine Kumin
Manufacturer: Houghton Mifflin
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0618507531

Book Description

From as little as the snail to as big as the giraffe, from the thundering mastodon of long ago to the ordinary backyard squirrel of today, the animals in this book inspire our imagination. Here is a fascinating cornucopia that exudes a whimsical affection and respect for the creatures with whom we share our kingdom.

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Joey and the Birthday Present
Maxine and Anne SEXTON KUMIN
Manufacturer: W.W. Norton
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000ILN3BE

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Of nature, the world and memory

Jack and Other New Poems
Maxine Kumin
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Selected Poems 1960-1990
The Long Marriage: Poems
Inside the Halo and Beyond: The Anatomy of a Recovery
No Heaven (Pitt Poetry Series)
Blackbird and Wolf: Poems

ASIN: 039332852X

Book Description

"Measured but warm, this work draws you in; it is another success among her many titles."—Library Journal In her fifteenth collection, Maxine Kumin meditates on the social consequences of such events as the bicentennial of the Civil War, and looks to poets writing from circumstances vastly different from her own. With death the central theme, poems of the body and praise songs for beloved animals explore how memory consoles and haunts.

Customer Reviews:

Of nature, the world and memory.......2005-01-24

A soft thump, the collision of nature's realities and a recognition of ageing. Kumin faces the truth that soon there will be a reckoning with the Grim Reaper. So begins the revelatory poetry of a woman dissecting her life, the recollections and reminders that spring to mind in the autumn years. In Magda of Hospice House:

"I love my work as a specialist in easement.
Death is the thing I know, its catch and gurgle."

Those of a certain generation are blessed with such reminiscences, be it yesterday or sixty years ago, each as fresh as the new morning. Perhaps this is the reward of old age, as visions spring complete from the mind, the passing years insignificant. But it is these memories that so endear Kumin's poetry, her incisive observations, without the taint of revision. In The Snarl, the poet reveals a bitter memory:

"...one of the clique that had snubbed me down to the bone
so that I ate my dry sandwich daily in a stall
in the john after Latin class"

The New England poet plants her feet squarely on the ground, knows her neighbor's names, takes nothing for granted and grapples daily with the disintegration of ageing bones. She gives no quarter and exposes her own foolish pretensions, bolstered by memories of old yearnings and bittersweet recollections. In sturdy Yankee phrases, Kumin writes of animals, dogs and horses as familiar as lifelong friends, their losses just as deeply mourned. In the title poem, Jack, Kumin writes of a long lost horse:

"Oh Jack, tethered in what rough stall alone
did you remember that one good winter?"

The endless cycle of death and the nature of ritual are familiar topics on a New England farm and Kumin lives each moment of this world, on intimate terms with its comings and goings. The subtle strength of these poems reaffirm Kumin's tenacity and appreciation for the living beings that surround her, their spirits as beloved as friends and family. Certainly, the world intrudes, but not with such great import as to erode the precious rhythms of farm life: "Let them slip through my hands/ weightless as the wind and fugitive as a dream" (Crossing Over). She does not withdraw from the world, but occupies a place where comfort is found and life is undeniable. Luan Gaines/2005.

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Selected Poems 1960-1990
Maxine Kumin
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton & Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Jack and Other New Poems
The Long Marriage: Poems
Women, Animals, & Vegetables: Essays & Stories
First Four Books Of Poems
Inside the Halo and Beyond: The Anatomy of a Recovery

ASIN: 0393318362

Amazon.com

In this extraordinarily lyrical overview of three decades of poems, Maxine Kumin delights the reader's ear again and again, especially in her ability to hear the music of nature. Consider, for instance, "In the Pea Patch": "These as they clack in the wind / saying castanets, saying dance with me, / saying do me, dangle their intricate / nuggety scrota." The melodic flow of the lines does a lot of poetic work for Kumin, reinforcing the poem's thematic celebration of nature's seductiveness and inherent eroticism. These are very beautiful, very knowing poems.

Book Description

Gathered from nine collections representing three decades of work, these poems-newly available here in a rich and varied volume-celebrate the growth of a major artist. Since the publication of her first book of poetry, Halfway, Maxine Kumin has been powerfully and fruitfully engaged in the "stuff of life that matters": family, friendship, the bond between the human and natural worlds, and the themes of loss and survival.

Our Ground Time Here Will Be Brief (Poets, Penguin)

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Our Ground Time Here Will Be Brief (Poets, Penguin)
Maxine Kumin
Manufacturer: Puffin
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0140586431

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Great book!

Lofty Dogmas: Poets on Poetics

Manufacturer: University of Arkansas Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Criticism | Poetry | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 1557287929

Book Description

Compiled by three noted poets, this is an eclectic, stimulating, and informed selection of poets' remarks on poetry spanning eras, ethnicities, and aesthetics. The 102 selections from nearly as many poets reach back to the Greeks and Romans, then draw on Chaucer, Shakespeare, Sidney, and Milton, on to Shelley, Keats, Coleridge, and Poe, then Hopkins, Yeats, Eliot, Rilke, and Pound, concluding with many of our contemporaries, including Hall, Clifton, Mackey, Kunitz, and Rukeyser. Selections from lesser known poets are also included, such as Moira Egan, Phyllis Wheatley, Fanny Howe, Lyn Hejinian, Joy Harjo, and Li-Young Lee.

The book is divided into three sections. "Musing" concerns issues of inspiration, "Making" issues of craft, from diction to meter to persona and voice, and "Mapping," the role of poetry and the poet. Headnotes at the beginning of each selection provide interesting background information about the poet and commentary on the significance of the selection. There is also a useful appendix with a listing of essays arranged according to more specific topics.

As the poets write in their introduction: "This book was intended to deepen readers' understanding of age-old poetic ideas while at the same time pointing out new directions for thinking about poetry, juxtaposing the familiar and the strange, reconfiguring old boundaries, and shaking up stereotypes."

Customer Reviews:

Great book!.......2006-10-29

This book is a great collection of writings by and interviews of poets that discuss many aspects of writing poetry. It's great for poetry classes of any level.

Always Beginning: Essays on a Life in Poetry

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Wonderful prose and great stories

Always Beginning: Essays on a Life in Poetry
Maxine Kumin
Manufacturer: Copper Canyon Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1556591411

Book Description

In her essays, as with her Pultizer Prize-winning poetry, Maxine Kumin is equally at ease musing over her garden or discussing poetic form, raising horses or critiquing the work of other poets. For Kumin, poetry is inseparable from daily life. Whether remembering the early days of courtship with her husband (who then worked at Los Alamos during the first nuclear tests) or observing a grandchild learning to swim, poetry is a natural part of the discussion, as when, during an MRI, she recounts the healing role of memorized poems: "Lying in my MRI tomb and doggedly reciting the poem against the terrible rapping, I realized what saved me..."

"Maxine Kumin's practical yet sensual New England reflections are a gift to any lover of the country."-New York Times Book Review

"Kumin, bless her heart, just gets better and better."-Library Journal

In addition to twelve volumes of poetry, Maxine Kumin has published books of essays, short stories, and novels, and collaborated on four children's books with the late Anne Sexton. The recipient of the Pulitzer Prize, she has also served as the Poet Laureate and was, until her recent controversial resignation, a chancellor at the Academy of American Poets. She lives with her husband, Victor, on a farm in central New Hampshire.

Table of Contents

Part One Excerpts from a June Journal Beans June 1, 1991: Sleeping Late June 16, 1991: Final Foal Journal Entry, PoBiz, Texas Notes from My Journal, Kyoto, December 1984

Part Two Interstices Swimming and Writing Motherhood and Poetics October 4, 1995 For Anne at Passover Recitations First Loves

Part Three An Appreciation of Marianne Moore's Selected Letters This Curious Silent Unrepresented Life Josephine Jacobsen Back to the Fairground: Mona Van Duyn A Postcard from the Volcano Essay on Robert Frost

Part Four Trochee, Trimeter, and the MRI: On A Shropshire Lad Gymnastics: The Villanelle A Way of Staying Sane Word for Word: "Poem for My Son" Scrubbed Up and Sent to School

Part Five Keynote Address, PEN-New Eng

Customer Reviews:

Wonderful prose and great stories.......2000-11-28

I was killing time waiting for a plane and found this book at the airport bookshop. I had never read any of Maxine Kumin's poetry. To give you an idea of how fluid and easy her prose is, I finished this book a few hours later. I could barely put it down. Ms. Kumin's full and fascinating life, as well as her approach to poetry, is a joy to read. I am only disappointed that there were not more of her own poems in this volume. A must-read for any lover of good writing.

Up Country: Poems of New England, New and Selected

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Bear Trail

Up Country: Poems of New England, New and Selected
Maxine W. Kumin
Manufacturer: Harpercollins
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Poetry | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0060124741

Customer Reviews:

Bear Trail.......2003-06-14

I love your poem of the bear trail, so narrow
in the woods.. 1 footprint behind the other
.. i especially love that you did not say
'pawprint'..

your poems have humor and joy and unique
visions of life

Authors:

Authors

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