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NEW & SELECTED POEMS, APPLEMAN 1956-1996

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Philip Appleman is one of the country's most important poets. This retrospective collection covers his career to date and is an excellent introduction to his work. Appleman's poems summon up a variety of emotions--alternatively anger, outrage, sadness and amusement. They never fail to be thought-provoking. A word of warning: Appleman is a humanist, and several of his pieces are criticial of religion. This is not greeting card verse, it's poetry for the mature intellect.

Appleman's work deserved to be more widely read. This is a fantastic collection of poems that are alternately funny, angry, and profound, and always connect the day-to-day with the universal. The poems from "Darwin's Ark" perfectly marry the poetic with the scientific, and bring light and metaphoric power to the concepts of evolution, even where it may only apply to cars. Additionally, the poems from "Let There Be Light" bring humor (and a healthy sense of absurdity) to the stories and characters from the Bible, without ever mocking the subject matter. Rather, the characters here are wonderfully human-- and Appleman's version of Noah's Ark is both tragic and laugh-out-loud funny. His work feels more relevant in today's post-9/11 world than ever. This is a powerful collection that can stand with the finest in contemporary verse; Appleman's work is not to be missed.

Philip Appleman is one of the nation's leading poets and this fine collection from the University of Arkansas Press collects his greatest poems over the course of the four decades. Appleman is always insightful and his poems cover a wide range of topics, from a charming poem for Valentine's Day to poems about Charles Darwin to poems about religion and politics. Appleman is often a fine poet but a number of his poems do not live up to their full potential due to the author's strong opinions. Appleamn is a humanist and, when he is subtle about inserting his views in a poem, such as "The Voyage Home," he is a master poet. But he is not always so subtle. Sometimes, he hits you over the head with his viewpoint which is often hilarious (such as his poem "Noah") but sometimes it is a bit much and more preachy than poetry ("Last-Minute Message from a Time Capsule" and "Judas"). Conidering how good he can be when he was writing a subtle poem, it is fair to say that Appleman should have used the stilleto more and relied less on the sledgehammer. Appleman's religious skepticism shapes some of his finest but also some of his weakest poems. While these flaws ensure that Appleman will not be one of the kings of American poetry, he maintained a healthy barony for almost a half century. Readers will profit from reading this fine poet.