Selected Poems (Paperback)

by Rita Dove (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"Remarkable . . . a poet of dramatic force." --The New York Review of Books

"Consistently accomplished . . . Dove's is a brilliant mind that seeks for itself the widest possible play, an ever-expanding range of reference, the most acute distinctions, and the most subtle shadings of meaning. . . . Her is a major career." --Arnold Rampersad, Callaloo

"Dove's poems, rich with elegant phrasing and Southern spice, blast tradition by pulling readers into other lives and then dazzle them with an often startling mastery of language." --Boston Globe

"Rita Dove . . . is a devoted and subtle storyteller [whose] gifts are evoking, and sometimes exalting, the everyday moments we live by but may neglect or forget, the music of her words issuing a message of uncanny integrity and calm.  Though often writing of private experience (mothering, mourning death, watching rain), she never seems to lose sight of the world beyond." --Newsweek -- Review

The Abduction
Adolescence: 1
Adolescence: 2
Adolescence: 3
Agosta The Winged Man And Rasha The Black Dove
Aircraft
Anniversary
Anti-father
The Ants Of Argos
At The German Writers Conference In Munich
Aurora Borealis
Banneker
Beauty And The Beast
Belinda's Petition
The Bird Frau
The Boast
Boccaccio: The Plague Years
Catherine Of Alexandria
Catherine Of Siena
Centipede
Champagne
The Charm
Cholera
Company
Compendium
The Copper Beech
Corduroy Road
Courtship
Courtship, Diligence
David Walker (1785-1830)
Daystar
Definition In The Face Of Unnamed Fury
Delft
Dusting
Early Morning On The Tel Aviv-haifa Freeway
Eastern European Eclogues
The Event
Exeunt The Viols
A Father Out Walking On The Lawn
Fiammetta Breaks Her Peace
First Kiss
The Fish In The Stone
Five Elephants
Flirtation
For Kazuko
Geometry
Gospel
Grape Sherbert
The Great Palaces Of Versailles
Great Uncle Beefheart
Happenstance
Headdress
The Hill Has Something To Say
A Hill Of Beans
His Shirt
The House On Bishop Street
The House Slave
Ike
In The Bulrush
In The Old Neighborhood
Jiving
The Kadava Kumbis Devise A Way To Marry For Love
Kentucky, 1833
The Left-handed Cellist
Lightin' Blues
Lines Muttered In Sleep
Magic
Motherhood
My Father's Telescope
Nestor's Bathtub
Nexus
Nigger Song: An Odyssey
Night Watch
Nightmare
Notes From A Tunisian Journal
Nothing Down
November For Beginners
O
Obedience
One Volume Missing
The Oriental Ballerina
Pamela
Parsley
Pearls
Pithos
Pomade
Primer For The Nuclear Age
Promises
Reading Holderlin On The Patio With The Aid Of A Dictionary
Receiving The Stigmata
Recovery
Refrain
Roast Possum
Robert Schumann, Or: Musical Genius Begins With Affliction
Roses
The Sahara Bus Trip
The Sailor In Africa
The Satisfaction Coal Company
The Secret Garden
Shakespeare Say
Sightseeing
The Slave's Critique Of Practical Reason
Small Town
The Snow King
Someone's Blood
The Son
Song Summer
Spy
Straw Hat
The Stroke
A Suite For Augustus: 1963
A Suite For Augustus: Augustus Observes The Sunset
A Suite For Augustus: Back
A Suite For Augustus: D.c.
A Suite For Augustus: Planning The Perfect Evening
A Suite For Augustus: Wake
Sunday Greens
Sunday Night At Grandfather's
Taking In Wash
'teach Us To Number Our Days'
Then Came Flowers
This Life
Thomas At The Wheel
Three Days Of Forest, A River, Free
To Bed
Tou Wan Speaks To Her Husband, Liu Sheng
The Transport Of Slaves From Maryland To Mississippi
Under The Viaduct, 1932
Upon Meeting Don L. Lee, In A Dream
Variation On Gaining A Son
Variation On Guilt
Variation On Pain
Weathering Out
Why I Turned Vegetarian
Wingfoot Lake
The Zeppelin Factory
-- Table of Poems from Poem Finder®

Review
"Remarkable . . . a poet of dramatic force." --The New York Review of Books

"Consistently accomplished . . . Dove's is a brilliant mind that seeks for itself the widest possible play, an ever-expanding range of reference, the most acute distinctions, and the most subtle shadings of meaning. . . . Her is a major career." --Arnold Rampersad, Callaloo

"Dove's poems, rich with elegant phrasing and Southern spice, blast tradition by pulling readers into other lives and then dazzle them with an often startling mastery of language." --Boston Globe

"Rita Dove . . . is a devoted and subtle storyteller [whose] gifts are evoking, and sometimes exalting, the everyday moments we live by but may neglect or forget, the music of her words issuing a message of uncanny integrity and calm.  Though often writing of private experience (mothering, mourning death, watching rain), she never seems to lose sight of the world beyond." --Newsweek

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: Vintage; 1st Vintage ed edition (September 28, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679750800
• ISBN-13: 978-0679750802
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.1 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #429,269 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful poems, September 29, 2000

By	HuckVT - See all my reviews

Rita Dove's poetry is challenging: lyric, attentive, sure; yet it works in quieter veins than many more exhibitionist poets of the past thirty years. In the volumes collected in this "Selected Poems" Dove explores race, domesticity, history. The single most impressive featis her collection *Thomas and Beulah* which consists of two long sets of lyric poems which, combined, narrate a story (of her grandparents, the Thomas and Beulah of the title) and create a drama -- since the way in which Thomas sees things, in his half of the volume, is utterly different from the way in which Beulah sees things. What is most surprising is how these two people can live together, but in such different worlds. Ther is both strength and delicacy in these poems, and Beulah in particular emerges as one of the more significant figures in contempoary literature.

(Dove's more recent works are also rich, and her "Mother Love" continues to explore, in a new way, the richness of family in America -- this time through a series of inventive sonnets, no two of which use the same sonnet form.)

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Rita Dove has a strong sense for narrative, April 20, 2007

By	Anthony Marray "amarrayw" (Ohio United States) - See all my reviews

What I love about Rita Dove's work is that she gives her poems a sense of narrative. It's easy to see why when you consider her background in writing fiction. She is influenced by her desire to give her poetry a self contained atmosphere that you see in fiction. I disagree with readers who think of her work as too cryptic. You really can't expect to fully understand her poems in one reading. You have to stand back (in a way) and think about her imagery and its connection to the narrative (best example to see this would be her work from Thomas and Beulah - which won the Pulitzer).I would recommend also reading "Conversations with Rita Dove" where she gives insight into how she approaches writing poetry and fiction.

3 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars I like her personally, though..., July 28, 2004

By	Master of (sitting here) - See all my reviews

I have all the respect in the world for Rita Dove--she is probably the most active Poet Laureate we have ever had, and I love her ideas, but this poetry is just unreadable--inaccessible and coded.