Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 811.54
EAN num: 9780140589214
ISBN number: 014058921X
Label: Penguin (Non-Classics)
Manufacturer: Penguin (Non-Classics)
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 96
Printing Date: April 01, 2000
Publishing house: Penguin (Non-Classics)
Release Date: April 03, 2000
Sale Popularity Level: 664537
Studio: Penguin (Non-Classics)
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Editor's Notes and Comments:
Brief Book Summary:
A new collection of elegant and precisely rendered poems by the National Book Award finalist.
Stephen Dunn called Lawrence Raab's last book 'a superb collection . . . Raab's poems evoke a world both recognizable and dreamlike, a world of slippery realities told from self-questioning perspectives.' With this collection, Raab has surpassed his earlier accomplishments.
His concerns range from dreams to space aliens, from the death of Shelley to the nature of friendship, from Hamlet to high school. Figured in landscapes both real and imagined--the probable worlds of our lives--these elegant poems form a meditation on what separates the actual from the possible. Of his previous collection, the National Book Award judges wrote, 'Not often in today's poetry has our mortal circumstance become so magical.' In his new book, the quiet clarity of Raab's voice moves calmly into the large, unanswerable mysteries of being--what our lives might become, or could have been but never were.
User popularity level:
Rated by buyers -
If you are a lover of poetry, buy this book. I you are not yet a lover of poetry, buy this book to become one.
Lawrence Raab's poems are lit from the inside with magic. They are poems to be read again, revisited like good friends.
After you've gifted yourself with this book, buy his others--they're all this good.
Rated by buyers -
Simply put: This book is excellent.
Rated by buyers -
When I teach poems to my 9th graders, I always give them a taste of Lawrence Raab's poetry because, as I tell them, "he captures the lyric beauty of our media-saturated culture" (it's fun to say this to 14-year-olds--they just kind of stare blankly at these sort of statements). And when I read "Attack of the Crab Monsters" aloud to them, some of them laugh, some of them (figuratively) scratch their heads, and some of them keep doodling obliviously in their notebooks, but then I read it aloud again and most of them begin to realize that poetry isn't all intricate puzzles, or frilly romances, or political statement...poetry is what you make it.
This new collection by Raab reveals a poet who has mastered his voice, and it's a voice that is poignant, witty, and profound. Raab's poetry tends to focus on the small, perhaps overlooked, details of life, like the dreams of his young daughter, the inexplicable joy of a dog, or the reminiscence of childhood fantasies.
Poems like "Great Art" or "Another Argument About the Impossible" deal with the artistic process itself. They comment on the thinking that occurs between the lines, behind the paint, and in so doing, quietly reveal an essential truth about life: we could have done things differently, but the other choices wouldn't have made things better, just...different.
I highly recommend THE PROBABLE WORLD to anyone who likes to think deeply about the small things in life.
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