Customer Reviews

Selected Poems: Anne Sexton

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Okay. No offense to Anne Sexton, but this book just doesn't cut it. The people who did the "selecting" didn't do a very good job. Many good poems which are hard to find are found, but many of her greatest that are easily found aren't even mentioned in this book. And why does Middlebrook always do the commentaries?? I love Anne Sexton and she needs to be portrayed for her art, not for the mentally ill, depressed, phsychotic person that she was. I mean--her poetry is terrific, and personally, I don't think that Middlebrook does a very good job of summarizing Anne Sexton to the readers.

Selected Poems of Anne Sexton draws from poet Sexton's ten published works of poems as well as from her last pieces to provide a fine introduction and overview to her best works. The editors reveal a wide range of styles and themes and provide new readers with a definitive overview. Highly recommended.

I'd seriously have to bicker with another reviewer and state that Middlebrook did a fine job selecting the "most worthy" of Sexton's poetry. Let's face it: towards the end of Sexton's career as a poet, she pumped out more garbage than grandeur...and Middlebrook (whose biography on Sexton, by the way, is among the best biographies on ANYbody) seems perfectly aware of that. With "Selected Poems" in print, scholars of poetry no longer have to plow through rubble to find a few diamonds.