The Art of Losing: Poems of Grief and Healing [Hardcover]

Kevin Young (Author)

Book Description

Release date: March 16, 2010 | ISBN-10: 1608190331 | ISBN-13: 978-1608190331 | Edition: 1

Poetry serves a unique role in our lives, distilling human experience and emotion down to truths as potent as they are brief. There are two times most people turn to it: for love and loss. Although collections of love poetry abound, there are very few anthologies for the grieving. In The Art of Losing, editor Kevin Young Kevin Young has introduced and selected 150 devastatingly beautiful poems that embrace the pain and heartbreak of mourning. Divided into five sections (Reckoning, Remembrance, Rituals, Recovery, and Redemption), with poems by some of our most beloved poets as well as the best of the current generation of poets, The Art of Losing is the ideal a gift for a loved one in a time of need and for use by ministers, rabbis, and palliative care workers who tend to those who are experiencing loss.

Among the poets included: Elizabeth Alexander, W.H. Auden, Amy Clampitt, Billy Collins, Emily Dickinson, Louise Gluck, Ted Hughes, Galway Kinnell, Kenneth Koch, Philip Larkin, Li-Young Lee, Philip Levine, Marianne Moore, Sharon Olds Mary Oliver, Robert Pinsky, Adrienne Rich, Theodore Roethke, Anne Sexton, Wallace Stevens, Dylan Thomas, Derek Walcott, and James Wright.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Young (Dear Darkness) is not only a prolific and acclaimed poet, but also the editor of several anthologies of poems, by African-American poets, inspired by the blues and jazz, and from the body of work by John Berryman. This latest anthology is his most topical, and, perhaps, his most useful, gathering poems about suffering and overcoming loss. Organized around subjects such as Regret, Remembrance, and Ritual, this book includes poets both canonical and contemporary, with perhaps a refreshingly larger helping of the latter: poets like Marianne More, Philip Larkin, and Elizabeth Bishop join newer names like D.A. Powell, Matthew Dickman, and Meghan O'Rourke; there are also plenty of reigning masters, like Louise Glück. Death is nature's way/ of telling you to be quiet, writes Franz Wright, somewhat harshly. With calmer acceptance, Theodore Roethke reminds us of the need to wake to sleep, and take my waking slow. While these poems won't offer easy answers to grief, they will keep the kind of company that only poetry can, because only poetry can convincingly say, as Ruth Stone does in the last poem of this book, All things come to an end./ No, they go on forever. (Mar.)
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From Booklist

Poet Young, author of six vividly imagined collections, puts on his editor’s hat, one he wears well in previous anthologies dedicated to blues and jazz poems as well as here in this unique and invaluable gathering of contemporary poems of grief and healing. This effort stems from his memorializing his late father in Dear Darkness (2008), a loss that sharpened his perceptions of what Young cites as “a poetry of necessity.” As he observes, “No one wants to write an elegy.” But “we simply must.” And in writing, reading, and listening to elegies, understanding, solidarity, and solace are found. Young offers an original and personal analysis of the modern elegy, and uses his own experience with the cycle of mourning to structure the book in sections titled “Reckoning,” “Regret,” “Remembrance,” “Ritual,” “Recovery,” and “Redemption.” And the poems are as diverse and universal as the emotions of loss. Poems by Dylan Thomas, Sharon Olds, Mary Jo Bang, Nick Flynn, Natasha Trethewey, Cornelius Eady, Gerald Stern, Lucille Clifton, and many others exquisitely and empathically translate pain into beauty, sorrow into catharsis. --Donna Seaman

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Bloomsbury USA; 1 edition (March 16, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1608190331
• ISBN-13: 978-1608190331
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 1.1 x 8.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.9 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #53,300 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #30 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Anthologies & Literary Collections > Poetry
  • #42 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Poetry > Inspirational & Religious
  • #64 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Sociology > Death

More About the Author

Kevin Young is the author of six books of poetry, most recently Dear Darkness, named one of the Best Books of 2008 by National Public Radio's All Things Considered, and winner of the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance Award in poetry. His book Jelly Roll: A Blues was a finalist for both the National Book Award and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and won the Paterson Poetry Prize. He is the editor of four other volumes, including Blues Poems, Jazz Poems, and the Library of America's John Berryman: Selected Poems. The curator of literary collections and the Raymond Danowski Poetry Library and Atticus Haygood Professor of English and Creative Writing at Emory University, Young lives in Boston and Atlanta.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

52 of 52 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars a diverse anthology for the full spectrum of grief March 20, 2010

By C. O. Aptowicz

Format:Hardcover

I wasn't surprised when I heard that Bloomsbury had asked poet Kevin Young to edit an anthology of "poems of grief and healing." After all, his book, "Dear Darkness" (written following the death of the poet's father) was filled with nuanced and human poems tackling his grief & celebrating the life of his father in surprising and honest ways.

Still, "The Art of Losing" exceeded my expectations of what this collection would be.

Firstly, I had to admire the wide range of poets: works by old standards like Emily Dickson, Dylan Thomas and Robert Frost, sit next to works newly minted legends Anne Sexton, John Berryman and Frank O'Hara, which are found next to contemporary favorites like Billy Collins, Sharon Olds and Mary Oliver, which are published next to young modern poets Nick Flynn, Elizabeth Alexander and Terrance Hayes.

Next, I was grateful for the full spectrum of grief that this book showcased. The book isn't filled only with poems politely eulogizing the newly sainted dead. No: there are poems which unapologetically wrestle sadness, frustration and anger. There are poems which celebrate, which brighten, which make us laugh. There are poems about the long dead, the newly passed and the people who are fading in front of us. It's not a book reserved only for the newly grieving, but a book for anyone who has experienced a loss at any time... in other words, a book for everyone.

And lastly, I was impressed by the structure of the anthology. Young did a great job of placing the pieces together in a way that made sense, but that wasn't blatant. The poems are divided into six sections: "Reckoning," "Regret," "Remembrance," Ritual," Recovery" and "Redemption." But it is important to note that they are not divided into 'Sad Poems,' or 'Happy Poems,' or 'Funny Poems;' Nor is the book divided into 'Poems You Know,' 'Poems You Don't Know By Poets You Do Know,' or 'Poems by New Poets You've Never Heard Of.'

No, Young allows the poems themselves to dictate their place in the book, creating interesting progressions and growth within each section. Each turn of the page illuminates something new, shows another angle, fills another hole we didn't realize was there: poems grieving siblings, are next to poems mourning wives, are next to poems celebrating the lives of grandparents; poems which will make you cry are bumped right next to poems which make you laugh, which conclude with poems that will make you pause and look around you in wonder. (It should be noted that the book ends with a index which helps spotlight poems which might be appropriate for funerals, as well as indexing poems which deal with death of a parent, death of child, etc...)

Kevin Young has done an absolutely incredible job with this collection, and I highly recommend it. I am positive it will be an anthology I will continue to turn to for years and years to come.

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Get it! March 18, 2010

By unoriginal

Format:Hardcover

This book is a beautiful and diverse anthology that is well deserving of any praise it is sure to receive. I would especially recommend it to anyone trying to find comfort in grieving the loss of loved one. Often grief feels solitary: no one else knows what this feels like, no one has been through it before. This book will prove to any reader that loss and pain is universal... and why not learn that lesson by reading these words and emotions so exquisitely expressed?

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars It speaks to the soul June 15, 2010

By nan

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

I wanted to read this collection of poems after hearing the author on a NPR broadcast. He was sincere without being sentimental, His thoughts went directly to the feelings you feel and can't express.I suffered the loss of a loved one and it's hard enough to deal with your emotions and then try to convey to those near you what you are thinking and feeling. It's enormous. This book carefully and sensitively puts into words what many of us need to release as we struggle through this common experience.