This is Frank Bidart’s first book of lyrics—his first book not dominated by long poems. Narrative elaboration becomes speed and song. ...
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Jan 01, 2012
Joanne
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I saw Frank Bidart read from this book in April 2011, at Vanderbilt University. He's an engaging speaker and well worth seeing if you have the opportunity. He read some shorter poems, including a sestina (“it’s my only sestina; it will be my only sestina – I feel lucky to have escaped with my neck”) and the very long poem “Ulanova at Forty-Six At Last Dances Before a Camera Giselle,” during which I fell asleep. In fairness to Bidart, I was working on a substantial sleep deficit and the reading w
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Oct 22, 2009
Matt
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I sort of forget how weird Bidart is when I'm not reading him, because his name has been in the background of my life for so long that it's almost comforting. His books, for all their wonderful qualities, are not a comfort.
Even when they are funny, as they often are, they are unsettling, pregnant with the sense that I'm missing something essential when I can't reassemble the poem. For what appears to be abstract, Bidart is able to invest the poems with a palpable sense of how important More...
Even when they are funny, as they often are, they are unsettling, pregnant with the sense that I'm missing something essential when I can't reassemble the poem. For what appears to be abstract, Bidart is able to invest the poems with a palpable sense of how important More...
Aug 02, 2011
Frank Bidart is one of my favorite living American poets, if not my very favorite, and I admire him for not jumping off a bridge in the tradition of Weldon Kees, John Berryman, Hart Crane, et. al. (Actually I think Crane jumped off a ship, but you get the idea.) The trouble is, at 66 Bidart may have said everything he has to say and this book largely reiterates his viewpoint on familiar themes such as sexuality (mostly homo-), death, and his Southern California background, while breaking no new
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May 31, 2009
Kent
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What I appreciate with Frank Bidart is the conscious argument he brings with his poems. I usually feel with his poems that his intelligent logic has managed to harness this great bounding poetic energy into a statement, or at least some discernible sense that I can claim I implicitly understand. In this book, I feel the main argument is dealing with age, and the way that old age idealizes its younger self. Fairly early (in "Tu Fu Watches the Spring Festival Across Serpentine Lake" to b
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Apr 18, 2011
Robert
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Frank Bidart, Watching the Spring Festival (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2008)
The jacket copy for Watching the Spring Festival mentions that Bidart's poetry here is less violent than his previous work. Maybe in the immediate sense, but there's still a streak of—what, nihilism?—a mile wide here:
“The desire to approach obliteration
precedes each metaphysic justifying it.”
(“Song of the Mortar and Pestle”)
Maybe not nihilism in the sense we think of it these days More...
The jacket copy for Watching the Spring Festival mentions that Bidart's poetry here is less violent than his previous work. Maybe in the immediate sense, but there's still a streak of—what, nihilism?—a mile wide here:
“The desire to approach obliteration
precedes each metaphysic justifying it.”
(“Song of the Mortar and Pestle”)
Maybe not nihilism in the sense we think of it these days More...
Jul 26, 2011
Jesse
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The latest from one of my favorite contemporary poets, this time with a focus on lyric poetry. There's a lot of typical Bidart--particularly in the appropriation of voices from various times in past, ranging from ancient China and Rome on up to the most ephemeral present (see the amusing, surprisingly poignant "Sanjaya at Seventeen"). But let's face it--Bidart is at his best when he gives himself the pages and pages and pages to explicate, to breath, to fall down rabbit holes on the
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Aug 18, 2009
Jon
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These poems definitely need to be read aloud...I started reading these and they seemed really opaque. Then I read them out loud (I'm a nerd) and my appreciation skyrocketed. The cadences and rhythms are compelling, but sometimes the meaning still was unclear...but any poetry book that features a poem about American Idol's Sanjaya will hold a special place in my heart.
Mar 01, 2011
Sarah
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Read this book for a poetry class and wasn't much enthralled.
I found the selections a bit convoluted, and I never felt the desire to slow down and really concentrate on any poem in particular, let alone reread any of them (which is usually my gauge for a good collection of poems). This is my first time reading Frank Bidart, and I might give some of his other work another chance, but this book just wasn't for me.
I found the selections a bit convoluted, and I never felt the desire to slow down and really concentrate on any poem in particular, let alone reread any of them (which is usually my gauge for a good collection of poems). This is my first time reading Frank Bidart, and I might give some of his other work another chance, but this book just wasn't for me.
Sep 25, 2009
Amy
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One of the rare books of poetry I enjoyed all the way through in one sitting and then picked up to reread immediately to see how it was put together. I will definitely be reading more Bidart as soon as possible.
Jan 03, 2009
Aaron
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Parts were beyond me, but there's no denying his mastery of language, and then there were those few poems and lines within poems that snuck up on me and felt like he was reading me rather than I him.
Apr 01, 2010
Greg
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IMO, one has to wonder what the publishers must be thinking when they put this kind of book on the mkt.
Jan 05, 2009
Anna
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I love Bidart's way with words. "You Cannot Rest" is one of my favorites in this collection.
Dec 29, 2008
heather
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every poem in this book is perfect.
"valentine" is certainly one of my favorite poems ever.
"valentine" is certainly one of my favorite poems ever.
May 04, 2008
Aerial Nun
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Don't let the "lyric" thing fool you -- this collection is still very Bidartistic. He opens with a poem called "Marilyn Monroe"? Just send me out to pasture already.
Apr 09, 2008
Ami
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