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26th out of 1,020 books
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1,053 voters
The Collected Poems, Vol. 1: 1909-1939
'And when the second and final colume of Williams' 'Collected Poems' is published, it should become even more apparent that he is this century's major American poet.' --Larry Kart, 'Chicago Tribune'
Paperback, 465 pages
Published
September 17th 1991
by New Directions Publishing Corporation
(first published 1951)
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William carlos williams is an excellent poet one of my favorite poem from him is Danse Russe
In Danse Russe, William Carlos Williams is taking a step out of the comfort zone. No man would actually tell people, that when their kid and wife is sleeping, they dance naked in front of their mirror. He is saying to everyone, so what if I admire my body and looks at myself, am I not still a man? He say “...who shall say I am not the happy genius of my household?” I believe when he is saying genius he...more
In Danse Russe, William Carlos Williams is taking a step out of the comfort zone. No man would actually tell people, that when their kid and wife is sleeping, they dance naked in front of their mirror. He is saying to everyone, so what if I admire my body and looks at myself, am I not still a man? He say “...who shall say I am not the happy genius of my household?” I believe when he is saying genius he...more
"To whom then am I addressed? To the imagination...It has always been a search for the 'beautiful illusion.' Very well. I am not in search of the 'beautiful illusion.' ...And if when I pompously announce that I am addresses-To the imagination-you believe that I thus divorce myself from life and and so defeat my own end, I reply: To refine, to clarify, to intensify that eternal moment in which we alone live there is but a single force-the imagination." (89)
"Because we love them-all. That is the s...more
Jan 22, 2013
Jon Corelis
rated it
5 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
five-star-poetry-books
Essential collection of a great American poet
***** A Five Star Poetry Book: Recommended for All Readers
W. C. Williams's poems are about as important to modern American poetry as the Rocky Mountains are to the American contintent: you can't get around them. As the reviews here indicate, he's still not to everyone's taste, but his influence is enormous, largely defining great areas of subsequent American verse (most of which however in my opinion isn't nearly as good as Williams himself.) If you a...more
***** A Five Star Poetry Book: Recommended for All Readers
W. C. Williams's poems are about as important to modern American poetry as the Rocky Mountains are to the American contintent: you can't get around them. As the reviews here indicate, he's still not to everyone's taste, but his influence is enormous, largely defining great areas of subsequent American verse (most of which however in my opinion isn't nearly as good as Williams himself.) If you a...more
Let's get past "The Red Wheelbarrow" shall we? William Carlos Williams is a god among poets and artists alike. Having spent his nights with artists like Duchamp and Picabia and his weekends with Wallace Stevens and Marianne Moore, it is no surprise. And yet it is rare to hear anyone singing the William Carlos Williams praises.
Art influenced Williams for lack of any other inspiration. I don't see in his work that he ever really separated art from the writing.
Reading his collection, which covers 1...more
Art influenced Williams for lack of any other inspiration. I don't see in his work that he ever really separated art from the writing.
Reading his collection, which covers 1...more
You really need to read the Collected to understand Williams. The various Selecteds out there really don't do this remarkable poet justice (though the review I read of Pinsky's new edited volume of Williams was positive--haven't checked that out yet). Williams was not just an Imagist poet, writing about how much depends on that red wheelbarrow, not just a free verse confessional poet of the late books, inspiration to Robert Lowell, the one who allowed him and Snodgrass and Plath and Sexton to "b...more
Just as the nature of briars
is to tear flesh,
I have proceeded
through them.
Keep
the briars out,
they say.
You cannot live
and keep free of
briars.
- from "The Ivy Crown"
WCW is a mixed bag: romantic, prolific, innovative, influential and often deeply moving, but he fails as often as he succeeds. Fortunately, his successes are truly phenomenal. Everyone knows The Red Wheelbarrow and far too much self-conscious ink has been spilled on that little poem for me to add any here. Many of...more
I decided to read the collected poems of William Carlos Willams upon the recommendation of a poetry instructor I had taken a class from a few years back. The examples that she had read out loud, I remembered as being so fresh, so contemporary and iconoclastic. But when I read this book, I didn't find any of that, I found poems that I would often be confused as to what the author was talking about. Or I would be reading a poem, satisfied that I understood, only to be thrown for a loop when coming...more
William Carlos Williams best stuff is in this early collection of his works. As a young man, he was simply more passionate about his thoughts and his writing. His typically writes free verse, but it is some of the best free verse of the 20th century. He, in my mind, is that writer who can dazzle and mesmerize with his light and playful descriptions as well as hit his reader in the head with a theological baseball bat.
Glad WCW worked through a lot of his early stuff in Vol. 1 to get to the good stuff in Vol. 2. Definitely the work of a tentative writer afraid to defy poetic conventions (or, definitely the work of a novice writer working his way through, and out of, poetic conventions).
Fantastic! The poems are top notch, of course, but what delighted me most about both volumes of this collection were the extensive notes at the back. They led me to several additional resources about Williams that I might not have found.
I had very high hopes for this. I've admired Williams based on things I'd learned about him as a person, and have appreciated some of his poems, but I just couldn't make my way through this collection. Somewhat problematic is that it starts with his earliest least developed poetry, which is clearly not his best, but as it went on I found myself liking his poetry less and less.
EDITED TO ADD: I've been reminded of some of his later poetry, and I think the problem is that I like Williams a lot, but...more
EDITED TO ADD: I've been reminded of some of his later poetry, and I think the problem is that I like Williams a lot, but...more
This book is like the Bible to me. Everyone who loves poetry should read it at least once in their lifetime.
Dec 08, 2008
Allen3459
is currently reading it
Constant source of new words
"the thing [the reader:] never knows... is what s/he is at the exact moment that s/he is. And this moment is the only thing in which I am at all interested.
I love my fellow creature. Jesus, how I love him: endways, sideways, frontways, and all the other ways — but s/he doesn't exist!
all art has been especially designed to keep up the barrier between sense and the vaporous fringe which distracts the attention from its AGONIZED APPROACHES TO THE MOMENT."
I love my fellow creature. Jesus, how I love him: endways, sideways, frontways, and all the other ways — but s/he doesn't exist!
all art has been especially designed to keep up the barrier between sense and the vaporous fringe which distracts the attention from its AGONIZED APPROACHES TO THE MOMENT."
I suspect that I will prefer Williams' later poems, and should find a copy of Vol. 2. It is interesting to chart his development through this volume, from rigidly following poetic convention to apparently trying a bit too hard to break it at every turn. Somewhere late in this volume, he begins to rein it in, and the poems he produced in the '30s are by far my favorites in this collection.
Basically I read this on the Point Pleasant beach
in summer of 1985.
My friend Rich Markert and I rented
a house off the Point Pleasant Beach, NJ canal. I ride my bike or car to
the main beach & read it for a month on vacation.
Great simple American poems. I tell everyone at the library to
read this one. Here's WCW!!!at his best.
in summer of 1985.
My friend Rich Markert and I rented
a house off the Point Pleasant Beach, NJ canal. I ride my bike or car to
the main beach & read it for a month on vacation.
Great simple American poems. I tell everyone at the library to
read this one. Here's WCW!!!at his best.
These were the first of William Carlos Williams' poems that I have read. I found the book in a used bookstore for $3, and I decided to buy it. I'm glad I did. This was a quick, excellent read. His poems gave me a strong sense of simple, New England living. It was a quiet and calming book.
I felt that the most accessible poems in this collection came from Williams's work AL QUE QUIERE. My favorite was entitled "Tract," a passionate poem about the powerful, often confusing and sometimes contradictory emotions that accompany one who is in the process of mourning.
Beautiful poetry!
This poem was a note WCW left for his wife on his refrigerator:
This is just to say
I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox
and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast
Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold
This is just to say
I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox
and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast
Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold
Probably not fair to give this only 3 stars. I still have this book and the poems that I can actually follow I really like but the later ones (these are arranged chronologically)I find really hard to understand.
Dec 25, 2007
Joseph Tepperman
added it
williams averaged 15 poems a year (many very very short), and even this was too much i think. oh but the gems he occasionally got! it's worth finding them.
William Carlos Williams' poems just make me happy. I also find it interesting that he was influenced by cubism and dadaism.
Feb 20, 2009
Kate
added it
I'm lying -- just can't get through it. Went back on the bookshelf a few months ago. I give up William!
William Carlos Williams got really crappy really quickly, but early on he's tolerable.
Early Poems (Dover Thrift Editions) by William Carlos Williams (1997)
I read the Volume
it was good
but that style
can be boring.
it was good
but that style
can be boring.
so much depends on a red wheelbarrow
Rereading Spring and All
Both volumes are amazing...
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William Carlos Williams was an American poet closely associated with modernism and Imagism. He was also a pediatrician and general practitioner of medicine. Williams "worked harder at being a writer than he did at being a physician," wrote biographer Linda Wagner-Martin. During his long lifetime, Williams excelled both as a poet and a physician.
Although his primary occupation was as a doctor, Will...more
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Although his primary occupation was as a doctor, Will...more
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“The noiseless wheels of my car
rush with a crackling sound over
dried leaves as I bow and pass smiling.”
—
5 people liked it
More quotes…
rush with a crackling sound over
dried leaves as I bow and pass smiling.”
My favorite poem:
so much depends
upon
the red wheel
barrow
glazed with rain
water
be...more
14 nov. 19:25