From Publishers Weekly
A magnificent achievement, this epic poem belies the common take that Snyder's poetic career is notable mainly in the past tense and is refracted by the works of others. Without doubt, Snyder's exploration of nature, Zen Buddhism and his travels through unexplored corners of American society influenced the Beat writers of the 1950s and early 1960s, and some of his early works (Riprap and Cold Mountain Poems, 1965, and Turtle Island, which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1975) are masterpieces. This new, vital work sums up stylistic and thematic concerns by uniting 39 poems written between 1956 and 1996 (many published here for the first time) into a seamless whole that, like a modern Leaves of Grass, combines fascination with the varied particulars of the way people live with awe at the majesty of nature. Each of four sections is organized around a familiar Snyder focus: the demands made on people by nature and time ("The road that's followed goes forever;/ in half a minute crossed and left behind"); observation of the terrain he occupies ("Slash of calligraphy of freeways of cars") and various American landscapes ("trucks on the freeways,/ Kenworth, Peterbilt, Mack,/ rumble diesel depths,/ like boulders bumping in an outwash glacial river"); and subtle tributes to those who have survived the last 40 years ("At the end of the ice age/ we are the bears, we are the ravens,/ We are the salmon/ in the gravel/ At the end of an ice age"). A concluding essay, "The Making of Mountain and Rivers Without End," serves as an intellectual mini-autobiography and a gloss on some of the Eastern influences on the poem. This is a major work by a venerable master of post-WWII American poetry.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Review
Afloat
Arctic Midnight Twilight Cool Horth Breeze With Low Clouds
The Bear Mother
The Black-tailed Hare
The Blue Sky
Boat Of A Billion Years
Bubbs Creek Haircut
The Canyon Wren
The Circumambulation Of Mt. Tamalpais
Covers The Ground
Cross-legg'd
The Dance
Earrings Dangling And Miles Of Desert
Earth Verse
The Elwha River
Endless Streams And Mountains
Finding The Space In The Heart
The Flowing
Haida Gwai North Coast, Haikoon Beach, Hiellen River Raven Croaks
The Hump Backed Flute Player
Instructions
Jackrabbit
Journeys
Ma
Macaques In The Sky
The Market
The Mountain Spirit
New Moon Tongue
Night Highway 99
Night Song Of The Los Angeles Basin
An Offering For Tara
Old Bones
Old Woodrat's Stinky House
Raven's Beak River At The End
Three Worlds, Three Realms, Six Roads
Under The Hills Near The Morava River
Walking The New York Bedrock Alive In The Sea Of Information
We Wash Our Bowls In This Water
With This Flesh
--
Table of Poems from Poem Finder®
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
