Margaret and Dusty

by Alice Notley

Poetry. "Notley is the foremost practitioner of the New York School of poetry. Heir to the likes of Frank O'Hara and widow of the larger-than-life Ted Berrigan, Notley has over the course of her last few books finally hit her stride.... Notley writes from an accumulation of meaning. Similar to the techniques of the abstract expressionists, it is in that heavily built-up surface that we find the depth of meaning.... Some poems are so right, so perfectly conceived, it's a wonder that anyone would write in any other way"—John Stickney, The Columbus Dispatch. "These poems, for the most part imaginary conversations with herself, are energetic, good clean fun. They also contain some serious under currents. At their best, they tease readers into a new way of viewing their surroundings"—Library Journal.

Genres: Poetry

80 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 1985

About the author

Alice Notley was an American poet. Notley came to prominence as a member of the second generation of the New York School of poetry—although she always denied being involved with the New York School or any specific movement in general. Notley's early work laid both formal and theoretical groundwork for several generations of poets; she was considered a pioneering voice on topics like motherhood and domestic life.
Notley's experimentation with poetic form, seen in her books 165 Meeting House Lane, When I Was Alive, The Descent of Alette, and Culture of One, ranges from a blurred line between genres, to a quotation-mark-driven interpretation of the variable foot, to a full reinvention of the purpose and potential of strict rhythm and meter. She also experimented with channeling spirits of deceased loved ones, primarily men gone from her life like her father and her husband, poet Ted Berrigan, and used these conversations as topics and form in her poetry. Her poems have also been compared to those of Gertrude Stein as well as her contemporary Bernadette Mayer. Mayer and Notley both used their experience as mothers and wives in their work.
In addition to poetry, Notley wrote a book of criticism (Coming After, University of Michigan, 2005), a play ("Anne's White Glove"—performed at the Eye & Ear Theater in 1985), a biography (Tell Me Again, Am Here, 1982), and she edited three publications, Chicago, Scarlet, and Gare du Nord, the latter two co-edited with Douglas Oliver. Notley's collage art appeared in Rudy Burckhardt's film "Wayward Glimpses" and her illustrations have appeared on the cover of numerous books, including a few of her own. As is often written in her biographical notes, "She has never tried to be anything other than a poet," and with over forty books and chapbooks and several major awards, she was one of the most prolific and lauded American poets. She was a recipient of the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize.

Reviews

[Clara Martin · Rating 5 out of 5]

The last poem "Sweetheart," written on my birthday in 1984, has been on my wall for years now, at least since high school, has followed me from room to room, state to state. It is hard to find "Sweetheart" online and I'm not sure where I first found it and copied it from (maybe a book on the New York School?). The full collection was also hard to track down, but I needed to verify that I had copied the poem right the first time (I had), and of course I was not surprised to find that the rest of the poems are just as wonderful.

[Rodney · Rating 5 out of 5]

Margaret and Dusty is Notley at her New York Schooliest, working conversational snippets, postcards, family in-jokes, kid talk, pop reference, and relaxed-fit erudition into the basic framework of the Romantic lyric: the adventure of a strongly limned self in progress through society and time. It’s hard not to hear in its music the last notes of post-OPEC crisis Bohemia; the coteries and occasions and playful forms of address the poems give life to and celebrate seem more far away in time than they really are. The pleasure for me is in assembling an America around lines like “You don’t change your drug habits though you might change/your attitude” or “I’m so with it I can’t believe it,” witty and occasionally acid anticipations of the hard rain to come: “But it was kind of nice aside from the realities of it all.”

[Griffin Alexander · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not quite as revelatory as Incidentals in the Day World or At Night The States, though there is strength and charm here, perhaps the funniest of Notley's books I have read (e.g., [of her two sons] "they're unbelievable Bohemians, they/ cough a lot." ; "I'm / mad at you still / for being as right as / I was so passionately myself") Perhaps out of context it doesn't pack the punch, but Notley is and always will be about her strange contextual shifts and turns in the flow of language, some that shock, some that crack you up in their newness and simultaneous eternal character, which makes you feel weird and excited for poetry's possibility all at once. Some on this site speak of this being her at her "New-York-School-iest," which is to say it feels (to me) as if she is holding back the most, all the scraps seem broken into parsable separate lines here (into dialogue, observation, internal thought) and sorting them out through the poem's voice seems doable—this is unlike the general blended (and unparsable) effect of emergence I have come to love of Notley, what Dana Ward calls in his great contemporary epic poem "Typing 'Wild Speech'", her "pure prosody."

Which is all a long and nicer way to say this is good for fans of Alice, and good for fans of Ted, and good for fans of the New York School, and great for fans of poetry, but it is not Notley's best, but so it is still better than your average very good book of poetry, so read it, but also please read At Night the States and Incidentals in the Day World, which are both collected in the indispensable Grave of Light: New and Selected Poems, 1970-2005.

[Jon P · Rating 4 out of 5]

I got this from the Jones library; I took a lot of enjoyment from pages and font.

[C · Rating 3 out of 5]

April

What if he doesn't like me
how will he find me there where I am
how will he find me the same me
that I am? What if

getting older means that
no one ever finds you, there
where you are, where they see you?
What if they get older

the same way a different way?
What if he won't let himself be found?
I know I'll like him, I'd
look for him, but what if

he can't find me? while
I'm there? like some others can't?

[Jared Joseph · Rating 5 out of 5]

By good I don't mean, I mean that I mean memory
Of good feeling. It would be fun to see you anyway
People can always be around just about all evening. Sure
People can surprise & whomp out a good. People
Are born in a trunk.

[Carrie · Rating 5 out of 5]

"with our
meth among the late lilacs & snow --"

[Rupert · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of my favorite books by her. Beautiful, brilliant, fresh, tasty.

[Lily · Rating 4 out of 5]

Often addressing Ted, meandering images and conversations, people passing through, these read like love poems to me. "What Does She Keep in that Drawer?" features "gold dust/ talcum/love dust/dirty sock dust/ cubic dust/blank dust/ blent dust/past due"and "Macho Daisy Duck" repeats the starting the line with "People" and what they are doing and how annoying they can be, these grounding repetitions sort of carry a rhythm or set a tone through the more stream of consciousness parts that can be random and silly.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my favorite of Notley's books, along wtih Alice Ordered Me to be Made and At Night the States. But as with her husband Ted Berrigan, I think the bulk of her work is pretty dull. But again, I love this book.