Sevastopol: On Photographs of War [Paperback]

Ansel Adams (Author), Mathew Brady (Author), Dmitri Baltermans (Photographer)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1879378299 | ISBN-13: 978-1879378292 | Publication Date: October 1, 1997

Poetic responses to 42 photographs taken from 1854 to 1997, mostly in times of war. The reader looks at the photo on the left page and measures the author's response on the right, meanwhile living through trying moments of history.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"William Allen's book of poems, based on photographs of war and its aftermath, is a book of profound conscience. It conveys deep understanding of the inhumane folly of war and its useless, needless sufferings in vivid language which augments stark visual imagery. Sevastopol is the work of an outraged heart wrought with emotive power--an important book" -- Daniela Gioseffi, author of Women and War

18 October 1977
At The Nursery Of A Locomotive Parts Plant Near Beijing
Baby Milk Plant
Brule Village, Wounded Knee
Burial At Sea
Ceausescu's Poet Laureate
Collaborateurs, St. Tropez
Dead German Ss Prison Guard
Destroyed Flying Fortress (photographer Unknown)
The Dunker Church, Antietam
Early Morning Calisthenics
Fight To The Death
Firing Range, Atlacatl
Goethe's Oak
Grief, Kerch, 1942
Heartbreak Hotel
Ill-political
Impression Made In The Ground At Billericay, By...
In The Valley Of The Shadow Of Death
Joe Louis In Italy, 1944
July Troubles In Petrograd
Kagera Falls
The March To Calumny
On North Brother Island, Half-crazed Survivors Of The Wreck
Park Suicides, Vienna
Photographer Photographing A Dead Horse
Place In The Sun Of The Son Of Henry Clay
Portrait Of An Italian Soldier
Reise In Die Vergangenheit
Riprende La Vita
Santo Domingo, Kilometro Ocho, Republica Dominicana
Shadows
Sowjetunion, 1941
Stalingrad, Revisited
Tent City, Homeless Shelter, Hoovervilles
Three Pike Street
Tule Lake Lava Beds, The Modoc Wars
Volleyball, Manzanar, Sierras
War Of The Worlds
Water
Williams Dreamland Theater
-- Table of Poems from Poem Finder®

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Water

This could be Samothrace, 1440 B.C.E. This could be Thebes, Yoknapatawpha, Mogadishu, Mars tomorrow. The space between the bird and girl is four and none and seven. Exactly palimpsest for nurses, argonauts, entrepreneurs-- the perimeter of sky, of what we can do if we try, of what we might do were we listening to the Congo bleed blue across the waste a salt sea feeds into islets. When the scavenger's beak into the center of civilizing soul, for mothers who run with curs and bitches, hissing babies back through doors to birth. Womb- rot stories from idiot-savants like us with sunsick overblown concern with craft, come car polish, shoe creme, Pulitzer prize and Chinese watercress-- shoot a can of Kodak, then go suck a muffler. Where will the water come from to feed the fish who've slipped into this ivied sepulchre of city? So we spin a nerve-root towards the reptile gut that sanctions each respite speck of truth, each solace gleaned a promise of wheatstraw grain for those who work in charity, folksong, litany and prayer. I sacrifice the origin of all ideals on Earth to give this girl a drink.

Product Details

• Paperback: 90 pages
• Publisher: Xenos Books (October 1, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1879378299
• ISBN-13: 978-1879378292
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.4 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,569,280 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars How War Can Be Fun., August 2, 1999

By 

Brendan M. Howard (Kansas, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Sevastopol: On Photographs of War (Paperback)

I can't help it.

I feel just horrible about it.

But, really, deep down, I found this book...uhh, well...this is so embarassing...

This book is FUN. It's sort of a dark example of a creative exercise...take various pictures from wars through photographic history and write a poem about how that picture makes you feel. Sometimes they're raw, sometimes they're tedious, but the entire exercise is interesting...and, I hate to sound like so damned callous, but...it's FUN.