The Complete Poems

by Elizabeth Bishop

Book by Bishop, Elizabeth

Genres: Poetry, Fiction

216 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 1969

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.

Elizabeth Bishop was an American poet and writer from Worcester, Massachusetts. She was the Poet Laureate of the United States from 1949 to 1950, a Pulitzer Prize winner in 1956. and a National Book Award Winner for Poetry in 1970. She is considered one of the most important and distinguished American poets of the 20th century.

Reviews

[William2 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rereading. Superb.

[James Badger · Rating 4 out of 5]

To call Elizabeth Bishop a hit-or-miss poet would be somewhat true, but completely unfair. She has an incredible sense of place in her work, and her poems are all technical marvels of some form or another. Not all of them speak to me, but I am always impressed with her craft.

[Stephanie Schultz · Rating 5 out of 5]

I must have a very well-used copy of this because as I was reading one day, the book felt apart into two pieces in my hands. WHAT DOES IT MEAN?

[Justin · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favorite is her early work, but many elements of Questions of Travel also resonate deeply. I'm not convinced that the Portuguese translations make a compelling contribution to the whole of the book, but they were clearly important to Bishop and therefore interesting. Of the new/uncollected works, the prose poems thrilled à la Borges; "Some Dreams They Forgot" is an incredible sonnet; and I enjoyed "Ouro Prêto" for sentimental reasons.

[Paul Lemcke · Rating 3 out of 5]

I just read a large selection of Bishop's poems throughout the book, and I found them beautiful, but I don't know enough about poetry to say much more than that.

[Suzanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Why didn't my English teachers ever assign Elizabeth Bishop? I feel lucky to have now discovered her work.

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love.

[Nicholas Huard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bishop has very keen observant set of eyes when writing poetry. No wonder why this collection won The National Book Award in 1970.

[Nancy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love so many of these poems (I say certain lines out loud at random moments: "We'd rather have the iceberg than the ship, although it meant the end of travel," "And love's the burning boy"), but the one that now moves me the most even though I didn't particularly like it when I first read it 30 years ago is "The Fish." Something about that fish, its scales, its gills, the irises of its eyes "backed and packed with tarnished tinfoil seen through the lenses of old scratched isinglass." And then the hook in its mouth, five hooks actually, deeply embedded... but I won't spoil the ending.

[Cassie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I feel like a faker writing a review for this, because I don't read much poetry and I don't feel like I have the knowledge or experience to critique it.

I will say that I learned about Bishop's poem "One Art" as a freshman in college and recently came across it again. It's what made me decide to pick up the "complete works" although I can now say with certainty it's a inaccurately titled because "One Art" never showed up.

I enjoyed the later poems (assuming they're chronological in their placement) more so than the earlier ones.

[Hannah Cobb · Rating 3 out of 5]

Elizabeth Bishop is commonly recognized as one of America's great female poets. Though it's a fairly old publication by now, this collection is beautifully put together, showcasing Bishop's intricate, tightly focused nature poetry (my favorite is The Sandpiper, with his "dark and brittle feet"), as well as her translations and travel poetry.

[Leslie · Rating 4 out of 5]

She is by far one of my favorite poets.