Just in: Word of Navigational Challenges : New and Selected Work [Hardcover]

Ed Roberson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1998

Poetry. African American Studies. Michael Palmer writes, "Ed Roberson offers us, up front, the nerve-edge of poetic speech, sequences of the unanticipated, as poetry of real significance is meant to do. This generous and much-needed selection graphs the development of a poet committed to the articulation of a resistant, multi-faceted identity. It should affirm his place, at last, as one of the most deeply innovative and critically acute voices of our time." JUST IN: WORD OF NAVIGATIONAL CHALLENGES is a chronicle of Roberson's works from 1970 to the present, marked throughout by a language derived from the rhythms of speech and the natural world: see in the river the ripples' / picture on the surface of the wind the lifting of the image / has taken at the deeper face // the starry freedom / written in the milky rivery line... (Taking the Print).

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Covering work from Roberson's first book, 1970's When Thy King Is a Boy, to recent "work in progress," this volume, as its title suggests, progresses through several modes of poetic address. The early work, just pushing beyond modernism's statelier modes, contains such Prufrockian lines as "and in the countryside the circumstance/ adds a spoon of dull explosion to the tea." The middle work is spiritual in tone, and features iconic imagery and spell-like choruses: "turn ambiguity/ into separation/ separation into repetition/ repetition into chant/ turn/ turn" he writes in "Formula for the Poem Dance." Other poems are fragment laden and overly ambiguous. The later, more narrative poems are the most successful, putting careful sound-play and full sentences to uses suggesting the Williams of "Asphodel" in pacing his musings. "By The Rivers of..." is a historical phantasmagoria: "They live in/ a timeless solution of their histories/ the living broth of their other/ lives, their dead, their brothers/ I find/ something familial/ familiar in these small squares/ these boxes buried in the public air." What makes Roberson's project cohesive is a persistent belief in the reaches of the meditating mind coupled with a serious critique of political realities, qualities that link him to an important sub-tradition of African-American literature that includes Nathaniel Mackey and Will Alexander, and to the main project of Talisman House, which is to uncover and rediscover poets writing on the margins. Without question the epitome of the "outsider" poet, Roberson is well discovered, even as this book hints at better work to come.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Review

18,000 Feet
The Aerialist Narratives, I: 1. Aerialist Narrative
The Aerialist Narratives, I: 11. Given Way
The Aerialist Narratives, I: 2. Taking The Print
The Aerialist Narratives, I: 3. Heading - The Landing
The Aerialist Narratives, I: 5. Properties
The Aerialist Narratives, I: 9. The Motorcyle Crossing
The Aerialist Narratives, Ii: 4
The Aerialist Narratives, Ii: 9
The Aerialist Narratives, Iii: 8. Ask For 'how High The Moon'
American Culture Is The Pot
Any Moment
Archaic Song Fm
At Having Seen There Was Great Stillness
Atmosphere Conditions
Be Careful
Beasts Dogs - The Bitter Water
A Black Man's Black Is His Mysteries
By The Rivers Of
Call From Vandall
Corner Stone
Dance, For The Balance Of New Mexico
Dani Word Song
Down Break Drum
Drawing This Way Hold Of You
Dreaming Has Made More Strict The Terms Of Dreaming
Everything In Place Was A First Thing
Flamenco Goyasques
Formula For The Poem Dance
Found: Under The Mountain Wall
Four Lines Of A Black Love Letter Between Teachers
A Hammer Is Always Brought To The Building
How Many Ever
I Don't See
I Remember Form
If You Think Of The Size
Interval And Final Day's Concerts: 3
It
It Must Be That In The Midst
It's Put These Days That
Jacket
The Killed Appear To The Killer
Like Sight Placed
Many Made No Sound When They Were Murdered
The Mojo Against Genocide Was Taken Care Of In The Beginning
The Music Someone Has Put On
Nature Poem
The Nature Poem
News
News Continued Release
The Next Song
The Note Of Seeing The Mark Of Sight
On The Calligraphy Of Black Chant
Once
Picking Up The Tune, The Universe And Planets
Program
Program For The Dance
Report
Seat
Seven Songs Of Loss Before The Next Song: 1
Seven Songs Of Loss Before The Next Song: 2
Seven Songs Of Loss Before The Next Song: 3
Seven Songs Of Loss Before The Next Song: 4
Seven Songs Of Loss Before The Next Song: 5
Seven Songs Of Loss Before The Next Song: 6
Seven Songs Of Loss Before The Next Song: 7
The Sole Irrhythm Ii
The Sole Irrhythm Iii
Song
Squall
Table
There Is A Way You Can Draw
There Is Against Explicit Stating What
They Are Crazy And Crazy
This Week's Concerts: 1
This Week's Concerts: 10
This Week's Concerts: 2
This Week's Concerts: 3
This Week's Concerts: 37
This Week's Concerts: 4
This Week's Concerts: 5
This Week's Concerts: 6
This Week's Concerts: 7
This Week's Concerts: 8
This Week's Concerts: 9
The Thousand Legged Foul To Sweet
War Song Sing
Wave
When Change
When Everyone Is Beauty Is A Time Of Day In Zulu
When Thy King Is A Boy
Word
The Worst Disappointment
You See It Clearly
The Zebra Is Two
-- Table of Poems from Poem Finder®

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 836 pages
• Publisher: Talisman House Pub (November 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1883689805
• ISBN-13: 978-1883689803
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,478,740 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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