false http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1171896768m/125218.jpg 125218 4 Farrar, Straus and Giroux first published Elizabeth Bishop's <i>Collected Prose</i> in 1984, five years after the poet's death. It's now too late to ask whether this deeply private woman would have allowed such an act, let alone approved of the biographies and studies that have begun to appear. It's not too late, however, to praise her editor's decision to gather her fiction and nonfiction together. Without it we would not have the dreamlike "The Sea & Its Shore" (in which a man hired to rid the beach of trash tries to make sense of each scrap of writing he comes upon) or memoirs such as "Primer Class," which begins, "Every time I see long columns of numbers, handwritten in a certain way, a strange sensation or shudder, partly aesthetic, partly painful goes through my diaphragm." Precise as ever, Bishop continues, "It is like seeing the dorsal fin of a large fish suddenly cut through the surface of the water." The collection's two standouts are "Efforts of Affection," a memoir of her mentor Marianne Moore, and the comic masterwork "The U.S.A. School of Writing." The latter is a sly recollection of her first job--at a deeply dodgy correspondence school. "Henry James once said that he who would aspire to be a writer must inscribe on his banner the one word 'Loneliness.' In the case of my students, their need was not to ward off society, but to get into it." 120599 1 11 1984 The Collected Prose total:98|5:36|4:38|3:23|2:1|1:0| 98 403 142 8 4 0 false false Sat May 02 23:23:13 -0700 2009 Sat May 02 23:30:28 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 1 false false Fri May 09 05:34:12 -0700 2008 Fri May 09 05:36:58 -0700 2008 5 0 false false Thu Sep 03 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri Sep 25 07:11:09 -0700 2009 Fri Sep 25 07:36:04 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Wed Mar 05 09:30:56 -0800 2008 Thu Mar 06 13:25:36 -0800 2008 more...]]> 4 0 false false Mon Aug 25 06:51:57 -0700 2008 Mon Aug 25 07:09:53 -0700 2008 this collection is a mix of personal essays, memoir pieces and short stories. it's gorgeous.
even though these works are taken from all throughout her career, and not compiled by her, there is amazing resonance between the pieces. it was wonderful to get the actual circumstances of ...more...]]> 5 0 false false Wed Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Thu Aug 09 23:13:10 -0700 2007 Mon Aug 13 00:48:40 -0700 2007 more...]]> 2 0 false false Sat Dec 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Sat Sep 29 06:29:40 -0700 2007 Sat Dec 08 12:10:30 -0800 2007
It's obvious she went to Walnut Hill. She's very good at networking.]]> 3 0 false false Fri Jul 27 16:09:48 -0700 2007 Fri Jul 27 16:09:48 -0700 2007 0 0 false false Sun Nov 29 18:00:32 -0800 2009 Sun Nov 29 18:00:48 -0800 2009 3 0 false false Sun Nov 15 16:02:39 -0800 2009 Sun Nov 15 16:02:39 -0800 2009 3 0 false false Wed Nov 11 21:07:35 -0800 2009 Wed Nov 11 21:07:35 -0800 2009 5 0 false false Thu Nov 05 08:37:35 -0800 2009 Thu Nov 05 08:37:35 -0800 2009 0 0 false false Sun Nov 01 17:15:30 -0800 2009 Sun Nov 01 17:15:33 -0800 2009 0 0 false false Fri Oct 30 18:25:26 -0700 2009 Fri Oct 30 18:25:26 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Fri Oct 30 07:43:03 -0700 2009 Fri Oct 30 07:43:05 -0700 2009 4 0 false false Tue Oct 27 13:07:41 -0700 2009 Tue Oct 27 13:07:41 -0700 2009 5 0 false false Sat Nov 14 17:15:25 -0800 2009 Thu Oct 22 12:54:22 -0700 2009 Thu Nov 05 23:10:29 -0800 2009 4 0 false false Mon Oct 05 12:35:31 -0700 2009 Mon Oct 05 12:35:31 -0700 2009 4 0 false false Thu Oct 01 12:02:20 -0700 2009 Thu Oct 01 12:02:23 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Tue Sep 29 15:39:10 -0700 2009 Tue Sep 29 15:39:10 -0700 2009 http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=125218