Crime Against Nature [Hardcover]

Minnie Bruce Pratt (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The Lamont Poetry Selection for 1989, this hard-edged and provocative collection takes its title from the Alabama statute under which Pratt ( We Say We Love Each Other ) would have faced criminal prosecution as a lesbian had she fought for legal custody of her children. The book centers on the poet's painful decision to give up her two young sons ("I paid for my freedom with my children") and her coming to terms with a choice forced on her by an unforgiving patriarchal system. Never sentimental or histrionic, Pratt's poems deal directly and explicitly with issues of anger, shame, sexuality and injustice. Thematic concerns of self-denial, separation, loss and the mother-child relationship are powerfully reinforced by recurring images of a "splintered" and "divided" self and Pratt's fragmentary narratives. By staying true to her lesbian identity, she earns the respect and love of her sons, who, although not in her custody, are not alienated from her. Here Pratt is finally able to tell her "version" and, ultimately, see herself not as victim but victor: "In my version, I walk / to where I want to live."
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

All The Women Caught In Flaring Light: 1
All The Women Caught In Flaring Light: 2
All The Women Caught In Flaring Light: 3
Another Question: 1
Another Question: 2
At Fifteen, The Oldest Son Comes To Visit: 1
At Fifteen, The Oldest Son Comes To Visit: 2
At Fifteen, The Oldest Son Comes To Visit: 3
At Fifteen, The Oldest Son Comes To Visit: 4
At Fifteen, The Oldest Son Comes To Visit: 5
At The Vietnam Memorial
The Child Taken From The Mother
Crime Against Nature: 1
Crime Against Nature: 2
Crime Against Nature: 3
Crime Against Nature: 4
Crime Against Nature: 5
Crime Against Nature: 6
Declared Not Fit
Down The Little Cahaba
Dreaming A Few Minutes In A Different Element: 1
Dreaming A Few Minutes In A Different Element: 2
Dreaming A Few Minutes In A Different Element: 3
Dreaming A Few Minutes In A Different Element: 4
The First Question
I Am Ready To Tell All I Know
In The Waiting Room At The Draft Board
Justice, Come Down
The Laughing Place
The Mother Before Memory: 1
The Mother Before Memory: 2
The Mother Before Memory: 3
The Mother Before Memory: 4
The Mother Before Memory: 5
Motionless On The Dark Side Of The Light
My Life You Are Talking About
No Place
The Place Lost And Gone, The Place Found
Poem For My Sons
Seven Times Going, Seven Coming Back
Shame: 1
Shame: 2
Shame: 3
Shame: 4
Shame: 5
Sounds From My Previous Life
Talking To Charlie
Two Small-sized Girls: 1
Two Small-sized Girls: 2
Two Small-sized Girls: 3
A Waving Hand
While Reading Timerman's The Longest War
-- Table of Poems from Poem Finder®

Product Details

• Hardcover: 128 pages
• Publisher: Firebrand Books (May 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0932379737
• ISBN-13: 978-0932379733
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.7 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,365,398 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars Pleasantly Surprised, December 10, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Crime Against Nature: The Lamont Poetry Selection for 1989 (Paperback)

I read this book because I was curious. Sandra McPherson, Alfred Corn, and Marvin Bell (the three judges who chose this book as the Lamont Poetry selection) are all accomplished poets, and I wondered how they had come to choose a book published by a small, feminist press like Firebrand books. I wasn't sure what to expect, but I ended up pleasantly surprised.

Pratt doesn't use rhyme, meter, or classical forms, of course, but this book still conveys a careful craft. Her words are often well chosen, and the arrangements feel original enough. A few of the poems might be too simplistic, but others are anything but. Also, it might not mean much to literature, but for a general reader like myself, the book was a darn good read. A story builds from the first poem to the last, and the story moved me. It was well put and well taken. The strong story made it closer to a page-turner that I thought poetry could be.

A squeamish reader might be turned off by the subject matter, I suppose, but I was taken by Pratt's honesty. I didn't catch a whiff of either pretense or empty politics in this book. I wouldn't put Pratt on the same level as the modern masters (Derek Walcott, for instance, or Elizabeth Bishop) and I still question if this was the BEST of all the second books of poetry published in 1989--but the book was pleasureable in more than enough ways to make it worth reading. I give it 3 1/2 stars.