The Shadow of Sirius [Hardcover]

W.S. Merwin (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 2008

Winner of the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry

Featured on NPR's "Fresh Air" and "The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer" on PBS.

Honored as one of the "Best Books of the Year" from Publishers Weekly.

"In his personal anonymity, his strict individuated manner, his defense of the earth, and his heartache at time's passing, Merwin has become instantly recognizable on the page; he has made for himself that most difficult of creations, an accomplished style." —Helen Vendler, The New York Review of Books

“Merwin is one of the great poets of our age.”—Los Angeles Times Book Review

"[The Shadow of Sirius is] the very best of all Merwin: I have been reading William since 1952, and always with joy." —Harold Bloom

"[Merwin's] best book in a decade—and one of the best outright... The poems... feel fresh and awake with a simplicity that can only be called wisdom." —Publishers Weekly

"Merwin's gentle wisdom and attentiveness to the world are alive as ever. These deeply reflective meditations move through light and darkness, old love and turning seasons to probe the core of human existence." —Orion

"[The Shadow of Sirius] shows the earthly possibilities of simple completeness in a writer's mature work. More than an achievement in poetry, this is an achievement in writing." —Harvard Review

The nuanced mysteries of light, darkness, presence, and memory are central themes in W.S. Merwin’s new book of poems. “I have only what I remember,” Merwin admits, and his memories are focused and profound—the distinct qualities of autumn light, a conversation with a boyhood teacher, well-cultivated loves, and “our long evenings and astonishment.” In “Photographer,” Merwin presents the scene where armloads of antique glass negatives are saved from a dumpcart by “someone who understood.” In “Empty Lot,” Merwin evokes a child lying in bed at night, listening to the muffled dynamite blasts of coal mining near his home, and we can’t help but ask: How shall we mine our lives?

somewhere the Perseids are falling
toward us already at a speed that would
burn us alive if we could believe it
but in the stillness after the rain ends
nothing is to be heard but the drops falling

W.S. Merwin, author of over fifty books, is America’s foremost poet. His last two books were honored with major literary awards: Migration won the National Book Award, and Present Company received the Bobbitt Prize from the Library of Congress.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. In his best book in a decade—and one of the best outright—Merwin points his oracular, unpunctuated poems toward his own past, admitting, I have only what I remember, and offering what may be his most personal, generous and empathic collection. Somehow, he manages to dissolve the boundaries between one time and another, seeming to look forward to the past or remember what has yet to happen, as in a recollection of traveling to Europe by boat and seeing a warship I recognized/ from a model of it I had made/ when I was a child/ and beyond it/ there was a road down the cliff/ that I would descend some years later/ and recognize it/ there we were all together/ one time. The poems show the marks of having weathered ...the complete course/ of life, but also feel fresh and awake with a simplicity that can only be called wisdom: the morning is too/ beautiful to be anything else. Gorgeous poems about enduring love melt time as well, looking toward a moment when we will be no older than we ever were. These are among Merwin's best poems, because, as he says, it is the late poems/ that are made of words/ that have come the whole way/ they have been there. (Sept.)
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From Booklist

With no punctuation and a solitary launching capital letter, Merwin’s elegant poems are built to the measure of breath and sweep the page like palm fronds. Yet each word is old, lustrous, and solid. Only a poet as seasoned as Merwin can wrest so much meaning from dark, moon, wake, river, and song. The questions he poses are as old as night, and the answers are forever elusive. The contrast between airiness and earthiness is intrinsic to master poet Merwin’s newest poems, lithe works steely in their testing of the mesh of memory and sensuousness; the coil of time, “our continuing fiction”; and the ripple of shadows attendant upon the brightest star, the most radiant life. Childhood reminiscences summon the dead and recall the now obsolete; the underworld masquerades as a coal mine or a shadow without form or “the darkness that is the mind of day.” And Merwin contemplates the earth’s verdant singularity in the “vault of darkness,” our entreaties “straying far out past the orbits and webs.” --Donna Seaman

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 120 pages
• Publisher: Copper Canyon Press (September 1, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1556592841
• ISBN-13: 978-1556592843
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #620,049 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

W.S. Merwin is the 17th Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry of the United States. He is the author of over fifty books of poetry, prose, and translations. He has earned every major literary prize, most recently the National Book Award for 'Migration: New and Selected Poems' and the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for 'The Shadow of Sirius.' He lives in Hawaii where he raises endangered palm trees.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

67 of 71 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Shadow of Sirius, April 16, 2009

By 

Pamela G. Maher (Baltimore, MD) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Shadow of Sirius (Hardcover)

After hearing a review of this book on NPR and discussion with the author, W.S. Merwin, I knew I had to purchase it. I'm so glad I did! I can open to any page and enjoy the beautiful turn of phrase and imagery that Merwin offers. It's my favorite book of poetry to date. I'm particularly fond of the poem on page 91, One of the Butterflies. I highly recommend this book!

36 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars What a marvel this humble book of wisdom shared, May 4, 2009

By 

Larry R. Smith "Midwest Reviewer" (Huron, Ohio USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Shadow of Sirius (Hardcover)

Perhaps the best description of this latest book of W. S. Merwin comes from these lines from his poem "Codex": "It was a late book given up for lost/ again and again with its sentences/ bare at last and phrases that seemed transparent/ revealing what had been there the whole way." This is one of Merwin's finest works coming near the end of a long career of sharing his quiet and intuitive vision of life and writing. Anyone who misses this misses a great deal. His voice is humble and wise.

26 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Explaining the Inexplicable, June 27, 2009

By 

Libra "MYK" (Tustin, CA USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Shadow of Sirius (Hardcover)

I do not read a lot of poetry and was not familiar with Merwin, but some of the Pulitzer reviews piqued my interest in The Shadow of Sirius. The short, somber poems in this volume use deceptively simple language and are pared of all punctuation except a beginning capital letter. It almost seems that each poem is an unwinding thought that the poet does not want to impede and wishes to leave reverberating in the air like a musician leaves his final note. The line breaks appear carefully arranged to emphasize ideas or words. Words and word choice are important to Merwin, who also worked for many years as a translator, but the inability of words fully to articulate experience is also an issue.

This slim volume is divided into three sections that deal loosely with youth, Merwin's dead dogs, and age. In interpreting the poems, the reader would gain by knowing some facts about the poet. For example, "the black dog" in section two refers to Merwin's black chow who went blind. Merwin now has some problems with his eyes, lived a time in France where he had an old house, reveres the natural environment, was the son of a minister, had a bleak childhood, is now a Zen Buddhist. These facts leave a print on his poems. It is possible to say that the poems are about memory, darkness, light, seasons, dogs, birds, parents and that the poems are are about something beyond their subjects.

None of the poems explain the books title, nor does the subject of Sirius come up anywhere. Since Sirius has a smaller shadow star, perhaps Merwin refers with this title to his process of poetry that contains both the desire to capture the flute music and the knowledge this it is impossible.