History of My Heart: Poems (Paperback)

~ (Author) "The figured wheel rolls through shopping malls and prisons, Over farms, small and immense, and the rotten little downtowns..." (more)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"History of My Heart includes . . . parents and boyhood neighbors, Fats Waller warming the Christmas crowd at Macy's, holocaust victims and the inspired derelicts beautifully summoned up in the poem 'The New Saddhus' . . . Mr. Pinsky has a rare gift for portraits of this kind, for action, character, and atmosphere clearly and buoyantly proportioned."--Roland Flint, The New York Times Book Review

"The core of Pinsky's third book of poems is the long title piece . . . [He] has written long poems from the beginning and established himself as a poet in the discursive mode with serious moral purposes . . . Pinsky mixes warm and often funny autobiographical anecdotes with long comfortable passages of commentary . . . What's especially interesting is the way Pinsky refrains from embedding his figures and fables in obligatory explanation. His voice is still engagingly talky, still confiding, anecdotal, funny, sober, and reflective . . . but it seems to pause more often, to see more deeply into the strangeness of things, and to be less concerned about continuity, connection, and closure."--Elizabeth Frank, The Nation
-- Review

Review

"History of My Heart includes . . . parents and boyhood neighbors, Fats Waller warming the Christmas crowd at Macy's, holocaust victims and the inspired derelicts beautifully summoned up in the poem 'The New Saddhus' . . . Mr. Pinsky has a rare gift for portraits of this kind, for action, character, and atmosphere clearly and buoyantly proportioned."--Roland Flint, The New York Times Book Review

"The core of Pinsky's third book of poems is the long title piece . . . [He] has written long poems from the beginning and established himself as a poet in the discursive mode with serious moral purposes . . . Pinsky mixes warm and often funny autobiographical anecdotes with long comfortable passages of commentary . . . What's especially interesting is the way Pinsky refrains from embedding his figures and fables in obligatory explanation. His voice is still engagingly talky, still confiding, anecdotal, funny, sober, and reflective . . . but it seems to pause more often, to see more deeply into the strangeness of things, and to be less concerned about continuity, connection, and closure."--Elizabeth Frank, The Nation

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Product Details

• Paperback: 64 pages
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (February 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374525307
• ISBN-13: 978-0374525309
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,346,294 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Strong, accessible work, May 19, 2002

By	Scott Woods (Columbus, Ohio United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Want to check out some poetry that won't blind you with its self-importance? Give Pinksy a whirl. He wasn't poet laureate for nothing, and this volume shows why: his work is everyday-ish, regular images told in regular language, but stacked in such a way that the power of the images play movies in your head with every turn of the page. The book gets off to a ripping start and calms down from there, but is no less compelling.

Like really good, quiet fireplace conversation.

4.0 out of 5 stars skillful, April 6, 2009

By	thespider (Manila) - See all my reviews

Reading this is reading a master at work. Pinsky wields so much skill it's ridiculous. Reading the poems here is like listening to an intelligent, old man sitting in a chair somewhere in a field, giving his thoughts free rein, following them where they land. In my opinion, the poem "The Figured Wheel" is a lyrical, breath-taking masterpiece.

1 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars we must feel bad that this was our Poet Laureate, August 18, 2003

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

Pinsky is in love with being a poet, but his poems don't mean anything to the rest of us. This book is a perfect example of this. We are supposed to admire him, not read him, and I find it a shame that this lousy work got him a Luareateship.