The Widening Spell Of Leaves (Pitt Poetry Series) [Paperback]

Larry Levis (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

These long poems join fragments of past pk events with present-day observations, creating gauzy reveries that lure the reader into the poet's dreamy consciousness. What Levis ( Winter Stars ) sees as he looks back is a life populated with images of blankness and extinction, pointing up that we are merely temporary residents in the void that is existence, "ticking away into / what we can do nothing about." Experience occurs as a series of existential still-lifes, frozen moments in time. Remembering a trip to Oaxaca, Levis recalls the "hush of the mountains above the . . . hush / Of the plaza . . . the / hush that is / Held in paintings the way a breath is held, but held / forever." In another poem, Levis asks what it means to be American. He answers: "It means, mostly, to go unnoticed . . . to type behind a / desk all day where no one / Sees you . . . . To perform your whole life in a silence." If Levis's transitions are sometimes unclear, his images are always pk piquant, particularly the final one of this powerful collection: "Riding beside me, your seat belt around your invisible / waist. Sweet Nothing. Sweet, sweet Nothing."
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

“Establishes him indisputably and once and for all as one of the younger masters.”
--North American Review

"In this book, Levis descends through memory and history with bravery and authority. He seems to be writing the poems we all need to read right now."
--Antioch Review

Product Details

• Paperback: 88 pages
• Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press; 1 edition (September 17, 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0822954540
• ISBN-13: 978-0822954545
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.8 x 0.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #574,882 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Classic Levis, April 2, 2008

By 

D. Zobel (Minneapolis, MN USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Widening Spell Of Leaves (Pitt Poetry Series) (Paperback)

Great book of poetry from the master of elegies. It's right up there with Winter Stars in my book.

5.0 out of 5 stars How the truth can be so unspectacular, August 15, 2011

By 

Kent Shaw (Huntington, WV) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Widening Spell Of Leaves (Pitt Poetry Series) (Paperback)

What is the absolute? Perhaps that's an odd question to ask this book considering how startlingly personal and layered with personal reflections the poems are. Sometimes I read this book and want only to be the speaker, Larry Levis. I don't care how painful his life has been. I don't care how he obsesses over the most painful moments. The speaker, Larry Levis, experiences humanity with a depth I can only hope I'm capable of, a depth that is actually palpable while reading the poems.

Most people I know respond to that Levis voice. The inexplicable texture and volume of it. I would say there is also an intellectual argument here as well. Because when you have lived through and reflected on the types of life choices he describes, and you realize you can't just call them mistakes, and you can't undo any small part of them, you come to realize the absolute quality of a fact. It might change history, or history might remain unchanged, even oblivious to what happened. But the fact will always remain.

For me, the magic of Widening Spell is the powerful sentimentality enabling Levis to speak of and around this delicate relationship between fact and history. It could be the history of a bomb going off in Oaxaca. It could be the speaker leaving his wife and son. Something in that Levis voice wishes that it would never quit telling me about anything. In the chronology of Levis' books, Widening Spell accomplishes the ambition that was hinted at in Winter Stars. And it outshines Elegy at least in its capacity to probe and probe into the most troubled parts of the very troubled life Levis puts on display.