In The Blood (Samuel French Morse Poetry Prize) [Paperback]

Carl Phillips (Author), Rachel Hadas (Contributor)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 30, 1992 | Series: Samuel French Morse Poetry Prize (Book 1992)

Winner of the Samuel French Morse Poetry Prize

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The publication of this volume introduces an unusually accomplished and innovative poet. The collection includes painterly poems, love poems, poems spun off of Greek mythology and Christian iconography, but at all times the work remains contemporary and strikingly self-assured. In "Luncheon on the Grass," for example, the speaker ruminates in precise, idiomatic and witty language on the awkward position of the nude woman in Manet's painting. The real surprise comes as the speaker continues: "Now, in a comparable state of outdoor / undress, I'm beginning to have a fair idea / of what's going on in that scene. . . ." By employing an unusual perspective, Phillips thus opens the material up in both perverse and fascinating ways. This technique governs the entire text; it lends intellectual strength to the work and allows Phillips to examine complicated and contradictory issues. In one of the most moving poems Phillips compares "the Famous Black Poet" to his father: " . . . his is the same unnervingly slow / rambling method of getting from A to B . . . " Phillips has developed his own painful but luminous method for traveling that trajectory, and it will be most interesting to see where it takes him from here.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Paperback: 69 pages
• Publisher: Northeastern; First Printing edition (October 30, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1555531350
• ISBN-13: 978-1555531355
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 6 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #825,347 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Carl Phillips is the author of 9 previous books of poems, including Quiver of Arrows: Selected Poems, 1986-2006; Riding Westward; and The Rest of Love, a National Book Award Finalist. His most recent collection, Speak Low, is a 2009 National Book Award Finalist. He teaches at Washington University in St. Louis.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A stunning debut, November 27, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: In The Blood (Samuel French Morse Poetry Prize) (Paperback)

I have read and admired poems by Carl Phillips for years but had never read one of his collections. With his third book about to be released from Graywolf, I decided to go back and read his first and second. To understand my impulse, one must realize that I consider one of Phillips' poems, "As from a Quiver of Arrows," (which originally appeared in THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY and was lately reprinted in THE BEST AMERICAN POETRY 1996) to be among the very best poems I have seen published in a magazine in the past decade. Despite my high expectations of the poet, this collection, his first, is absolutely amazing. Unlike many first books that hold the voices of many masters in its poems-the poet trying on "different skins"-Carl Phillips' collection holds a distinctive new voice. There is no W.H. Auden, no Elizabeth Bishop, no Wallace Stevens or W.C. Williams. There is Carl Phillips, his exacting poems that never miss a step. There is a security here, a poet confident in his abilities, the skill of one who has been doing this for years. Phillips' poems seem more like poems written by our contemporary masters than by a young poet! The obsessions I associate with his work are there: the body, a love of detail, the physical world that at any moment can be transformed, the mind fleeting from place to place with an awe-inspiring agility. Along with the book EMPTY SLEEVES by Sidney Wade, I count this collection as one of the best first book published in the last 10 years. No reader of poetry should miss this book. IN THE BLOOD was selected by Rachel Hadas as the winner of the 1992 Samuel French Morse Prize and published by Northeastern University Press. Carl Phillips is also the author of CORTÉGE and the soon to be released FROM THE DEVOTIONS, both from Graywolf Press.// C. Dale Young, Associate Editor of NEW ENGLAND REVIEW