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The Museum of Clear Ideas: New Poems
This is Donald Hall's most advanced works extending his poetic reach even beyond his recent volumes, The One Day and Old and New Poems. Conflict dominates this book, and conflict unites it. Hall takes poetry as an instrument for revelation and discovery, whether in "Another Elegy," a comic, pathetic portrait of a (fictional) contemporary poet, or in "Baseball," in which a narrator called K.C. (swinging his bat from the Mudville of the poet's desk) fantastically attempts to explain the all-American game to a long-dead German artist. "Baseball" occupies nine innings, each inning composed of nine stanzas, each stanza composed of nine lines, each line composed of nine syllables.
The title series of poems, "The Museum of Clear Ideas," imitates, but does not translate, the first book of the Odes of Horace. A cool, witty voice identifies itself as Horace Horsecollar, an old Walt Disney character; yet no sooner does one voice establish itself than another voice contradicts it. By such means are ideas exhibited and clarified. The book's final section, "Extra Innings," moves with terrible poignancy to questions about the end of the game, each inning adding another stanza, each stanza another line, each line another syllable, until the game is over.
The Museum of Clear Ideas, exalting artifice, breaks beyond artifice to the heart of reality. As Thom Gunn wrote of Hall's The One Day, "It is one of those books, like Elizabeth Bishop's last collection, which alters the way we look at the jumbled contents of the poetic career preceding it, giving it retrospectively a shape, a pattern, a consistency it didn't seem to have at the time."
The title series of poems, "The Museum of Clear Ideas," imitates, but does not translate, the first book of the Odes of Horace. A cool, witty voice identifies itself as Horace Horsecollar, an old Walt Disney character; yet no sooner does one voice establish itself than another voice contradicts it. By such means are ideas exhibited and clarified. The book's final section, "Extra Innings," moves with terrible poignancy to questions about the end of the game, each inning adding another stanza, each stanza another line, each line another syllable, until the game is over.
The Museum of Clear Ideas, exalting artifice, breaks beyond artifice to the heart of reality. As Thom Gunn wrote of Hall's The One Day, "It is one of those books, like Elizabeth Bishop's last collection, which alters the way we look at the jumbled contents of the poetic career preceding it, giving it retrospectively a shape, a pattern, a consistency it didn't seem to have at the time."
- GenresPoetry
128 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1993
About the author
Donald Hall
194 books209 followersDonald Hall was considered one of the major American poets of his generation.
His poetry explores the longing for a more bucolic past and reflects the poet’s abiding reverence for nature. Although Hall gained early success with his first collection, Exiles and Marriages (1955), his later poetry is generally regarded as the best of his career. Often compared favorably with such writers as James Dickey, Robert Bly, and James Wright, Hall used simple, direct language to evoke surrealistic imagery. In addition to his poetry, Hall built a respected body of prose that includes essays, short fiction, plays, and children’s books. Hall, who lived on the New Hampshire farm he visited in summers as a boy, was also noted for the anthologies he has edited and is a popular teacher, speaker, and reader of his own poems.
Born in 1928, Hall grew up in Hamden, Connecticut. The Hall household was marked by a volatile father and a mother who was “steadier, maybe with more access to depths because there was less continual surface,” as Hall explained in an essay for Contemporary Authors Autobiography Series (CAAS). “To her I owe my fires, to my father my tears. I owe them both for their reading.” By age twelve, Hall had discovered the poet and short story writer Edgar Allan Poe: “I read Poe and my life changed,” he remarked in CAAS. Another strong influence in Hall’s early years was his maternal great-grandfather’s farm in New Hampshire, where he spent many summers. Decades later, he bought the same farm and settled there as a full-time writer and poet.
Hall attended Philips Exeter Academy and had his first poem published at age 16. He was a participant at the prestigious Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference, where he met Robert Frost, that same year. From Exeter, Hall went to Harvard University, attending class alongside Adrienne Rich, Robert Bly, Frank O’Hara, and John Ashbery; he also studied for a year with Archibald MacLeish. Hall earned a BLitt from Oxford University and won the Newdigate contest for his poem “Exile,” one of the few Americans ever to win the prize. Returning to the United States, Hall spent a year at Stanford, studying under the poet-critic Yvor Winters, before returning to Harvard to join the prestigious Society of Fellows. It was there that Hall assembled Exiles and Marriages, a tightly-structured collection crafted in rigid rhyme and meter. In 1953, Hall also became the poetry editor of the Paris Review, a position he held until 1961. In 1957 he took a position as assistant professor of English at the University of Michigan, where he remained until 1975. While at Michigan, Hall met the young Jane Kenyon. They later married and, when Hall’s grandmother, who owned Eagle Pond Farm, passed away, bought the farm, left teaching, and moved there together. The collections Kicking the Leaves (1978) and The Happy Man (1986) reflect Hall’s happiness at his return to the family farm, a place rich with memories and links to his past. Many of the poems explore and celebrate the continuity between generations. The Happy Man won the Lenore Marshall/Nation Prize. Hall’s next book, The One Day (1988), won the National Book Critics Circle Award. A long poem that meditates on the on-set of old age, The One Day, like much of Hall’s early work, takes shape under formal pressure: composed of 110 stanzas, split over three sections, its final sections are written in blank verse. The critic Frederick Pollack praised the book as possibly “the last masterpiece of American Modernism. Any poet who seeks to surpass this genre should study it; any reader who has lost interest in contemporary poetry should read it.” Old and New Poems (1990) contains several traditional poems from earlier collections, as well as more innovative verses not previously published. “Baseball,” included in The Museum of Clear Ideas (1993), is the poet’s ode to the great American pastime and is structured around t
His poetry explores the longing for a more bucolic past and reflects the poet’s abiding reverence for nature. Although Hall gained early success with his first collection, Exiles and Marriages (1955), his later poetry is generally regarded as the best of his career. Often compared favorably with such writers as James Dickey, Robert Bly, and James Wright, Hall used simple, direct language to evoke surrealistic imagery. In addition to his poetry, Hall built a respected body of prose that includes essays, short fiction, plays, and children’s books. Hall, who lived on the New Hampshire farm he visited in summers as a boy, was also noted for the anthologies he has edited and is a popular teacher, speaker, and reader of his own poems.
Born in 1928, Hall grew up in Hamden, Connecticut. The Hall household was marked by a volatile father and a mother who was “steadier, maybe with more access to depths because there was less continual surface,” as Hall explained in an essay for Contemporary Authors Autobiography Series (CAAS). “To her I owe my fires, to my father my tears. I owe them both for their reading.” By age twelve, Hall had discovered the poet and short story writer Edgar Allan Poe: “I read Poe and my life changed,” he remarked in CAAS. Another strong influence in Hall’s early years was his maternal great-grandfather’s farm in New Hampshire, where he spent many summers. Decades later, he bought the same farm and settled there as a full-time writer and poet.
Hall attended Philips Exeter Academy and had his first poem published at age 16. He was a participant at the prestigious Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference, where he met Robert Frost, that same year. From Exeter, Hall went to Harvard University, attending class alongside Adrienne Rich, Robert Bly, Frank O’Hara, and John Ashbery; he also studied for a year with Archibald MacLeish. Hall earned a BLitt from Oxford University and won the Newdigate contest for his poem “Exile,” one of the few Americans ever to win the prize. Returning to the United States, Hall spent a year at Stanford, studying under the poet-critic Yvor Winters, before returning to Harvard to join the prestigious Society of Fellows. It was there that Hall assembled Exiles and Marriages, a tightly-structured collection crafted in rigid rhyme and meter. In 1953, Hall also became the poetry editor of the Paris Review, a position he held until 1961. In 1957 he took a position as assistant professor of English at the University of Michigan, where he remained until 1975. While at Michigan, Hall met the young Jane Kenyon. They later married and, when Hall’s grandmother, who owned Eagle Pond Farm, passed away, bought the farm, left teaching, and moved there together. The collections Kicking the Leaves (1978) and The Happy Man (1986) reflect Hall’s happiness at his return to the family farm, a place rich with memories and links to his past. Many of the poems explore and celebrate the continuity between generations. The Happy Man won the Lenore Marshall/Nation Prize. Hall’s next book, The One Day (1988), won the National Book Critics Circle Award. A long poem that meditates on the on-set of old age, The One Day, like much of Hall’s early work, takes shape under formal pressure: composed of 110 stanzas, split over three sections, its final sections are written in blank verse. The critic Frederick Pollack praised the book as possibly “the last masterpiece of American Modernism. Any poet who seeks to surpass this genre should study it; any reader who has lost interest in contemporary poetry should read it.” Old and New Poems (1990) contains several traditional poems from earlier collections, as well as more innovative verses not previously published. “Baseball,” included in The Museum of Clear Ideas (1993), is the poet’s ode to the great American pastime and is structured around t
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
November 25, 2024
I knew Donald Hall, and I can hear his voice reading these poems as I read them, or in some cases, try to read them.
I regret to say most of these poems are not to my taste. But, what do I know from poetry?
My favorite poems from this volume are
Let Many Bad Poets;
an homage to the joys of the singular peace and pleasures of your unfamous hometown and private life
Mount Kersarge Shines;
another celebration of simple, personal life routines shared with a partner away from the madding crowd
Camilla, Never Ask;
a foreboding of death, and, here, especially poignant as the older poet outlived his younger poet wife.
I regret to say most of these poems are not to my taste. But, what do I know from poetry?
My favorite poems from this volume are
Let Many Bad Poets;
an homage to the joys of the singular peace and pleasures of your unfamous hometown and private life
Mount Kersarge Shines;
another celebration of simple, personal life routines shared with a partner away from the madding crowd
Camilla, Never Ask;
a foreboding of death, and, here, especially poignant as the older poet outlived his younger poet wife.
August 27, 2018
Most people who are quasi-familiar with the late Donald Hall's work tend to label him as a poet who wrote about nature and living the country life. These are certainly elements of his poetic world (See Kicking the Leaves). But this book is an antidote to this perception. This book reads like a long poem. It is lively and ambitious work that deals with the essentials of life-and-death and the Red Sox! Definitely worth making time for.
May 4, 2018
"Baseball" and "Extra Innings" are worth the read. Baseball as life. Kurt, do you understand baseball now?
August 16, 2023
3.5
Even when he was being erudite/obtuse, he still didn’t pull any punches.
Even when he was being erudite/obtuse, he still didn’t pull any punches.
October 21, 2025
His non-fiction is fantastic, his poems, however, are not for me.
February 24, 2016
I've read two other volumes of poetry by Donald Hall--Kicking the Leaves and Poems Old and New--and this is my least favorite of the three. Excellent lines are followed by mediocre lines or lines that I just don't get. If you want to read really fine poetry, read Donald Hall's Kicking the Leaves.
July 30, 2007
The way he weaves the poems is truly incredible. Extra Innings is my favorite section.
February 20, 2010
So, in no special order: It has 'museum' in its title. It's by Donald Hall. And the long, exended poem that ends the book is about the Red Sox, love, loss and life. What's not to adore?
January 8, 2013
I found it to be too hard to comprehend.
July 1, 2015
I'm never "finished" with this book. I will always return to it. Hall is a master: the old mountain sage, who offers deep wisdom in the form of observations about his relationships.
March 19, 2012
Gave to K., who also loves Donald Hall.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews