Books Received in 2014

November 18, 2014

 

Mario Vargas Llosa, trans. Edith Grossman, The Discreet Hero. Farrar, Straus and Giroux: New York, NY (2014).

 

Murasaki Shikibu, trans. Dennis Washburn, The Tale of the Genji. W.W. Norton and Company: New York, NY (2014).

 

Robin Clarke, Lines the Quarry. Omnidawn Publishing: Richmond, CA (2013).

 

Ewa Chrusciel, Contraband of HoopoeOmnidawn Publishing: Richmond, CA (2014).

 

Joshua Corey, The Barons. Omnidawn Publishing: Richmond, CA (2014).

 

Trans. Claudia Keelan, Truth of My Songs: Poems of the Trobairitz. Omnidawn Publishing: Richmond, CA (2014).

 

November 13, 2014

 

Anthony McCann, Thing Music. Wave Books: Seattle, WA (2014).

 

Ernst Meister, Wallless Space. Wave Books: Seattle, WA (2014).

 

Nick Monfort, #1. Counterpath: Denver, CO (2014).

 

Katy Bohnic, Dear Alain. Tender Buttons Press: New York (2014).

 

November 6, 2014

Michael Collier,  An Individual History. W.W. Norton & Company: New York, NY (2014).

 

Dan Albergotti, Millenial Teeth. Southern Illinois University Press: IL (2014).

 

Dorothea Lasky, Rome. Liveright Publishing Corporation: New York, NY (2014).

 

Nathanaël, Sotto l’immagine. Mémoire d’encrier: Montréal, Québec (2014).

 

Volker Braun, Rubble Flora: Selected Poems. Seagull Books: London (2014).

 

Dale Herd, Empty Pockets: New and Selected Stories. Coffee House Press: Minneapolis, MN (2014).

 

Jeffery Schultz, What Ridiculous Things We Could Ask of Each Other. University of Georgia Press: Athens, Georgia (2014).

 

Ray Di Palma, Obedient Laughter. Otis Books | Seismicity Editions: Los Angeles, CA (2014).

 

Louis Cabri: Posh Lust. New Star Books: Vancouver (2014).

 

Michelle Detorie, After-Cave.  Ahsahta Press: Boise, ID (2014).

 

Joel Felix, Limbs of the Apple Tree Never Die. Verge Books: Chicago, IL (2014).

 

TC Tolbert, Gephyromania. Ahsahta Press: Boise, ID (2014).

 

Andrew Durbin: Mature Themes. Nightboat Books: New York (2014).

 

Cody-Rose Clevidence, Beast Feast. Ahsahta Press: Boise, ID (2014).

 

Michael Longley, The Stairwell. Wake Forest University Press: Winston-Salem, NC (2014).

 

 Christopher Middleton, Loose Cannons. University of New Mexico Press: New Mexico (2014).

 

October 30, 2014

 

Wade Stevenson, The Color Symphonies. BlazeVOX [Books]: Kenmore, NY (2014).

In this dazzling collection of poetry , Stevenson meditates on color, light, and acts of creation.

 

Jennifer Moxley, The Open Secret. Flood Editions: Chicago, IL (2014).

Moxley’s newest collection of poetry confronts middle age and the poet’s passage through time, taking an unsparing look at the costs of her long-held devotion to poetry.

 

Colette, trans. Zack Rogow and Renée Morel,Shipwrecked on a Traffic Island and Other Previously Untranslated Gems. Excelsior Editions: Albany, New York. (2014).

Rogow and Morel have gathered in this volume previously untranslated essays, articles, and short stories by the celebrated French author Colette. Highlights include her portraits of cats, dogs, Maurice Chevalier, and Marcel Proust.

 

Christian Wiman, Once in the West. Farrar, Straus and Giroux: New York, New York. (2014).

Wiman returns to his West Texas roots in his fourth collection of poetry, using terse, harsh language to create an intensity “it would take a native/to know was love.”

 

July 23rd, 2014

 

David Ray Vance, Stupor. Elixir Press: Denver, CO (2014).

In a new collection of poetry, Vance explores the ways in which the modern world both heals and numbs—the side effects of a Western society inundated with relentless and often shocking stimuli from the media.

 

Chris Tysh, Our Lady of the Flowers, Echoic. Les Figues Press: Los Angeles, CA (2013).

A loose translation of Jean Genet’s 1943 novel, Notre-Dame-des-Fleurs. This postmodern reimagining, in verse, traces the story of three imaginative characters—Divine, Mignon Dainty-Feet and Our Lady—as they move through the seedy Parisian underworld.

 

Matthias Regan, gapers’ delay. Harmolodic Essays. Virtual Artists Collective (2014).

Regan follows a practice of “spontaneous composition” in this new book, with poetic essays that explore various expository genres, from oration to rap to soliloquy. Some stand as textual or literary analysis, others as political commentary. Many were written with oral recitation in mind.

 

Kathleen Jesme, Albedo. Ahsahta Press: Boise, ID (2014).

Jesme’s new poetry mourns a recently passed father. But Albedo is not solely a portrait of grief; Jesme asks questions about the psyche and the unconscious, the power of language and the pervasiveness of certain mental images.

 

Chad Davidson, From the Fire Hills. Southern Illinois University Press: Carbondale, IL (2014).

A volume of poetry dedicated to ancient and modern cultural manifestations of Italy and Italian culture. Davidson explores the tension between the deeply entrenched romanticized view of Italy that persists today, and the nation’s complicated, chaotic and grittier reality.

 

David Jaffin, Light Sources. Shearsman Books: Berkeley, CA (2013).

These collections of poetry are substantial in volume. And while Jaffin proves himself to be decidedly prolific, his individual pieces of verse are bite-sized, brief, crisply restrained and profoundly philosophical.

 

 

July 2nd, 2014

 

Robert Fitterman, Holocaust Museum. Counterpath: Denver, CO (2013).

In his latest work of Conceptual writing, Fitterman has appropriated the captions of images from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and divorced them from their photographic contexts.

 

Oscarine Bosquet, Mum is Down. The Post-Apollo Press: Sausalito, CA (2014).

Bosquet’s fourth volume of poetry, published originally in French, has been translated into English by Cole Swensen.

 

Maureen N. McLane, This Blue. Farrar, Straus and Giroux: New York, NY (2014).

McLane’s third volume of poetry. McLane was a finalist for the 2012 National Book Critics Circle Award for her 2012 book My Poets, which blends memoir and criticism.

 

Laura Moriarty, Who That Divines. Nightboat Books: Brooklyn & Callicoon, NY (2014).

In this follow-up to A Tonalist (Nightboat, 2010), another hybrid of prose and poetic forms, Moriarity contributes further notes (and poems) toward the definition of a postmodern lyric. This collection brings together shorter puzzles and songs, as well as longer historical and autobiographical writing. Included here is “An Air Force,” an experimental memoir.

 

Harry Clifton, The Holding Center: Selected Poems, 1974-2004. Wake Forest University Press: Winston-Salem, NC (2014).

This new selection spans 30 years of Clifton’s poetry, praised for the gracefulness of its music and the concentration of its acts of attention. While many of Clifton’s poems reflect on Irish history and contemporary Irish life, his body of work is international in scope, the product of years spent throughout Europe, Africa, and Southeast Asia.

 

Phil Cordelli, Manual of Woody Plants. Ugly Duckling Presse: Brooklyn, NY (2013).

A poetic field guide—each poem in Cordelli’s new collection is named for a type of North American flora.

 

Brian Blanchfield, A Several World. Nightboat Books: Brooklyn & Callicoon, NY (2014).

Taking its title from a 17th-century poem by Robert Herrick, Blanchfield’s new book is the follow-up to his first collection of poetry, Not Even Then (University of California Press, 2004). This new work raises those ontic-cum-political questions about singularity and collectivity familiar from Objectivist precursors like George Oppen but in a rhetorical mode closer to a different modernist line, from Hart Crane and W.H. Auden to John Ashbery and the Cambridge school.

 

Eleni Sikelianos, You Animal Machine (The Golden Greek).Coffee House Press: Minneapolis, MN (2014).

This memoir-essay-poem hybrid traces the life of Melena, a burlesque dancer and mother of three. The story of the author’s grandmother,You Animal Machine is Sikelianos’ follow up to the similarly multi-genre telling of her father’s life, The Book of Jon (City Lights, 2004).

 

Jena Osman, Corporate Relations. Burning Deck: Providence, RI (2014).

In a new book of documentary-based poetry, Osman pulls clauses from Supreme Court cases and constitutional documents in order to critically explore the history of corporate personhood in the United States.

 

Willis Barnstone, Moonbook and Sunbook. Tupelo Press: North Adams, MA (2014).

Barnstone’s new book includes mirroring “lunar” and “solar” sections—the poetry written primarily in sonnet form.