Dream Work [Paperback]

Mary Oliver (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1986

Dream Work, a collection of forty-five poems, follows both chronologically and logically Mary Oliver’s American Primitive, which won her the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 1983. The depth and diversity of perceptual awareness — so steadfast and radiant in American Primitive — continues in Dream Work. Additionally, she has turned her attention in these poems to the solitary and difficult labors of the spirit — to accepting the truth about one’s personal world, and to valuing the triumphs while transcending the failures of human relationships.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

In the making of her poems, Oliver wields the most delicate of instruments: precision similes and astonishing metaphors. Though Dream Work , her seventh book, is somewhat less sucessful than Twelve Moons or American Primitive , which won the 1984 Pulitzer Prize, few lyric voices can match hers in paying homage to the natural world. Yet, her "dream works" can be palpably tragic. Inured to the absence of her estranged father ("Rage" and "A Visitor"), Oliver "saw what love might have done had we loved in time." And "Members of the Tribe" is a remarkable address to artists and poets on death and art. There are still too many echoes of James Wright in her workreferences to body, blessing, blossom, and bone. But that is a minor demur against one who is developing into a major poet. J.P. Lewis, Integrative Studies Dept., Otterbein Coll., Westerville, Ohio
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

“Her poems are wonderingly perceptive and strongly written, but beyond that they are a spirited, expressive meditation on the impossibili­ties of what we call lives, and on the gratifications of change.” —Hayden Carruth

“Oliver’s poems are thoroughly convincing—as genuine, moving, and implausible as the first caressing breeze of spring.” —The New York Times Book Review

“One of the astonishing aspects of [Oliver’s] work is the consistency of tone over this long period. What changes is an increased focus on nature and an increased precision with language that has made her one of our very best poets. . . . These poems sustain us rather than divert us. Although few poets have fewer human beings in their poems than Mary Oliver, it is ironic that few poets also go so far to help us forward.” —Stephen Dobyns, The New York Times Book Review

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Product Details

• Paperback: 96 pages
• Publisher: Atlantic Monthly Press (May 1986)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0871130696
• ISBN-13: 978-0871130693
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #17,480 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #35 in Books > Literature & Fiction > United States > Poetry
  • #92 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Poetry

More About the Author

A private person by nature, Mary Oliver has given very few interviews over the years. Instead, she prefers to let her work speak for itself. And speak it has, for the past five decades, to countless readers. The New York Times recently acknowledged Mary Oliver as "far and away, this country's best-selling poet." Born in a small town in Ohio, Oliver published her first book of poetry in 1963 at the age of 28; No Voyage and Other Poems, originally printed in the UK by Dent Press, was reissued in the United States in 1965 by Houghton Mifflin. Oliver has since published many works of poetry and prose. As a young woman, Oliver studied at Ohio State University and Vassar College, but took no degree. She lived for several years at the home of Edna St. Vincent Millay in upper New York state, companion to the poet's sister Norma Millay. It was there, in the late '50s, that she met photographer Molly Malone Cook. For more than forty years, Cook and Oliver made their home together, largely in Provincetown, Massachusetts, where they lived until Cook's death in 2005. Over the course of her long and illustrious career, Oliver has received numerous awards. Her fourth book, American Primitive, won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1984. She has also received the Shelley Memorial Award; a Guggenheim Fellowship; an American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters Achievement Award; the Christopher Award and the L.L. Winship/PEN New England Award for House of Light; the National Book Award for New and Selected Poems; a Lannan Foundation Literary Award; and the New England Booksellers Association Award for Literary Excellence. Oliver's essays have appeared in Best American Essays 1996, 1998, 2001; the Anchor Essay Annual 1998, as well as Orion, Onearth and other periodicals. Oliver was editor of Best American Essays 2009. Oliver's books on the craft of poetry, A Poetry Handbook and Rules for the Dance, are used widely in writing programs. She is an acclaimed reader and has read in practically every state as well as other countries. She has led workshops at various colleges and universities, and held residencies at Case Western Reserve University, Bucknell University, University of Cincinnati, and Sweet Briar College. From 1995, for five years, she held the Catharine Osgood Foster Chair for Distinguished Teaching at Bennington College. She has been awarded Honorary Doctorates from The Art Institute of Boston (1998), Dartmouth College (2007) and Tufts University (2008). Oliver currently lives in Provincetown, Massachusetts, the inspiration for much of her work.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

54 of 54 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars These poems are luminous and exquisite...., October 19, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Dream Work (Paperback)

_Dream Work_ is the first Mary Oliver book that I found, way back in 1989 while ill with pneumonia. "The Journey", possibly Mary's most popular poem, leapt out at me and quite literally opened my mind to a deeper commitment to self-care. That poem was Good Medicine!! ... "Wild Geese" has been another balm; who among us couldn't feel more tender towards ourselves when we read these lines, "You do not have to be good./You do not have to walk on your knees/for a hunded miles through the desert, repenting./You only have to let the soft animal of your body/love what it loves."?

36 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars So Beautiful It Will Make You Cry Like A Baby, April 17, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Dream Work (Paperback)

Mary Oliver is the poet I always point to first to contradict people who say, "For poetry to be good, it has to be depressing." Oliver continually proves that being hopeful, appreciative, and optimistic isn't necessarily incompatible with being a good artist/writer or a person who thinks analytically and critically. The poems in this book largely deal with nature, art, or music, and with appreciating the natural world, even if that appreciation sometimes needs to be forced.

I still don't know how Oliver does it. . . something about the clarity of her language makes subjects and philosophies that would sound trite or sugary in the lines of any other writer deeply moving. Perhaps because she doesn't embellish on her subjects, but lets the images and ideas speak for themselves.

32 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Graceful Muse, December 6, 2005

By 

John Paul Jaubert (Houston, TX) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Dream Work (Paperback)

I was a little tired of studying one day years ago and decided to pick up something entirely different and read it instead. I did a random search for whatever words came to my fingertips first. I was away at college and feeling a little homesick I guess. As I recall, the words included "moonlight", "home", and "dream". I got back Twelve Moons, House of Light, and Dreamwork. That started my romance with Mary Oliver.
I'm aware that many people say her imagery is too rich, too luxurious, and that it is not so much elemental as "stock". I also believe that that's like criticizing Tchaikovsky or Strauss or Puccini for being too melodic, too beautiful, too sad, too delightful.
I see no reason to believe that popularity and artistic value must be inversely proportional. Quite the contrary, I wish that more people could know about this wonderful woman to whom I am so deeply grateful.