Riprap and Cold Mountain Poems (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

Review

"As early as the 1950s, before ecology became a household word, Snyder understood things about our civilization and economy that no one else was talking about, and he wrote about them with great authority and a sinewy line." -- Richard Tillinghast, The Nation

"His greatest strength-a quiet and profound elegance, an ability to write a simple phrase that seems to have been echoing through human consciousness for three or four thousand years." -- Lewis MacAdams, California Magazine

"Long ago staked his claim as one of America's finest poets...[An] unswerving integrity [is] present throughout the development of Snyder's poetic sensibility." -- Boston Herald

"The master of lucid meditation." -- Los Angeles Times Book Review

"This poet's great gift has always been perfect visual clarity... and, needless to say, derives from Snyder's vision in the larger sense." -- Paul Berman, The Village Voice

Cold Mountain Poems: 1
Cold Mountain Poems: 10
Cold Mountain Poems: 11
Cold Mountain Poems: 12
Cold Mountain Poems: 13
Cold Mountain Poems: 14
Cold Mountain Poems: 15
Cold Mountain Poems: 16
Cold Mountain Poems: 17
Cold Mountain Poems: 18
Cold Mountain Poems: 19
Cold Mountain Poems: 2
Cold Mountain Poems: 20
Cold Mountain Poems: 21
Cold Mountain Poems: 22
Cold Mountain Poems: 23
Cold Mountain Poems: 24
Cold Mountain Poems: 3
Cold Mountain Poems: 4
Cold Mountain Poems: 5
Cold Mountain Poems: 6
Cold Mountain Poems: 7
Cold Mountain Poems: 8
Cold Mountain Poems: 9
Above Pate Valley
All Through The Rains
At Five A.m. Off The North Coast Of Sumatra
Cartagena
For A Far-out Friend
Goofing Again
Hay For The Horses
Higashi Hongwanji
Kyoto: March
The Late Snow & Lumber Strike Of The Summer Of Fifty-four
Mid-august At Sourdough Mountain Lookout
Migration Of Birds
Milton By Firelight
Nooksack Valley
Piute Creek
Praise For Sick Women
Riprap
The Sappa Creek
A Stone Garden
T-2 Tanker Blues
Thin Ice
Toji
Water
-- Table of Poems from Poem Finder®

Review

“The master of lucid meditation . . . Readers are fortunate to have what Snyder wants to pass on.” —Los Angeles Times Book Review

“Long ago staked his claim as one of America's finest poets . . . [An] unswerving integrity [is] present throughout the development of Snyder's poetic sensibility.”
—Boston Herald

“As early as the 1950s, before ecology became a household word, Snyder understood things about our civilization and economy that no one else was talking about, and he wrote about them with great authority and a sinewy line.” —Richard Tillinghast, The Nation

--This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

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Product Details Paperback: 67 pages Publisher: North Point Press (September 1990) Language: English ISBN-10: 0865474567 ISBN-13: 978-0865474567 Product Dimensions: 10.3 x 5.4 x 0.3 inches Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews) Amazon.com Sales Rank: #611,688 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books) Popular in this category: (What's this?) #14 in  Books > Literature & Fiction > Authors, A-Z > ( S ) > Snyder, Gary

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	85% buy the item featured on this page: Riprap and Cold Mountain Poems 4.8 out of 5 stars (6)
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	3% buy The Gary Snyder Reader: Prose, Poetry, and Translations 5.0 out of 5 stars (9) $17.16

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Customer Reviews

6 Reviews 5 star:  (5) 4 star:  (1) 3 star:    (0) 2 star:    (0) 1 star:    (0)           Average Customer Review 4.8 out of 5 stars (6 customer reviews)		Share your thoughts with other customers:
Most Helpful Customer Reviews 29 of 31 people found the following review helpful: 5.0 out of 5 stars "Drinking cold snow-water from a tin cup.", June 20, 2001 By  tepi "tepi" - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    Amidst the poetry of the Sixties, Gary Snyder's early poems stood out as something very special, and are still very special. In contrast to the obscure and convoluted writings of an assortment of neurasthenic, super-sophisticated, and compulsive scribblers, types so totally and utterly wrapped up in themselves that they completely overlooked that insignificant thing hovering outside their window (ordinary folks call it the universe), and whose work goes unread because it is largely unreadable, Snyder's work came as a revelation. Here was a poet who was very, very different - a poet who, far from being totally wrapped up in himself, was instead wrapped up in the universe. He appeals to us because, being himself wholly in touch with reality, he helps us get back in touch with reality ourselves. Ego is put firmly in its place, opening up a space in which the myriad things can come forward and announce themselves. The secret of how Snyder was able to do this, of how he was able to bring us, not yet another of those obscure, tortured and anguished sensibilities who were and still are so thick on the ground, but who brought instead a sane and wholesome vision of the world, is all there in the very first poem of RIPRAP, 'Mid-August at Sourdough Mountain Lookout' : "Down valley a smoke haze / Three days heat, after five days rain / Pitch glows on the fir-cones / Across rocks and meadows / Swarms of new flies. // I cannot remember things I once read / A few friends, but they are in cities. / Drinking cold snow-water from a tin cup / Looking down for miles / Through high still air" (p.9). Where did Snyder learn how to do this? The answer is that it could only have been in China. The poem is the perfect expression, in English, of that commonsensical attitude that grounds itself firmly in realities; that keeps ego firmly under control; that practises a reasonable, as opposed to an excessive, use of reason; and that is commonly found in the best Chinese and Zen poets. To translate Zen-man Han Shan, Snyder penetrated so deeply into the spirit of Han Shan that he succeeded in becoming a sort of American Han Shan himself. The result is a poetry not of coteries, of academic and intellectual circles, of super-sophisticated and pretentious Ivy League graduates, but poems that have real meaning and that can be read with understanding and enjoyment by anyone The poetry of RIPRAP and COLD MOUNTAIN, like the poetry of many Chinese and Japanese poets, is a wholesome poetry, a poetry that cleanses and refreshes the sensibility, and that transports us from the technoid madness of our own chaotic world to something more human and hence more meaningful. There's real sustenance for the spirit in these poems. They're like "drinking cold snow-water from a tin cup." Readers would be unwise to pass them by. 18 of 18 people found the following review helpful: 5.0 out of 5 stars The book contains good early Snyder poems and fine translati, August 7, 1998 By A Customer This book passes the test of time because of its taut poetry and insight into the link between Sndyer's environment in the Pacific Northwest and his inner landscape. The second part of the book is priceless. Snyder's Zen practice and skill as a writer and linguist make him eminently qualified to translate the words of the reclusive poet Han-Shan, whose poems ring true today. I have read other translations of Han-Shan but Snyder's is the best. Its paradoxes move us in our modern times just as they must have in early China. 13 of 14 people found the following review helpful: 5.0 out of 5 stars Luminous early poetry and translations by Poet Snyder, September 28, 1995 By A Customer Riprap lets us see the world with Snyder's vision back in the days when Kerouac was writing about him in the Dharma Bums. The clarity, straightforward diction, and simple lyricism that have continued to characterize his poetry are all here in these early poems from the fifties. Astounding visual quality. Life in the mountains, in Japan, on the high seas. Cold Mountain Poems are translations of Han Shan, Chinese Zen poet. Han Shan stands with John of the Cross in his ability to illuminate the spiritual path through lyric imagery. Snyder's crystalline translations reveal Han Shan to us face to face, today, not some old exotic hermit but a vital presence.		Ad feedback   Most Recent Customer Reviews 5.0 out of 5 stars Han Shan, Shi-de et al. Each man sweeps the things he hates Into the neighboring room; The coward does it with a sword, The brave man with a broom. --me Published 16 months ago by Julie M. Vognar 4.0 out of 5 stars RipRap is BoneandMarrow These are poems of rock and stone, of bone and marrow. Snyder has great eye-mind coordination. Rip-Rap will not be lost in the clutter of time. Read and be changed. Published 17 months ago by Harry W. Devlin 5.0 out of 5 stars Cold Mountain like Shakuhachi The great thing about Cold Mountain is that he is transparent to translators. Arguing the merits of one Cold Mountain translation against another is like comparing a Gudo... Read more Published on June 23, 2006 by eurydike Search Customer Reviews Only search this product's reviews

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Product Details

• Paperback: 67 pages
• Publisher: North Point Press (September 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0865474567
• ISBN-13: 978-0865474567
• Product Dimensions: 10.3 x 5.4 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #611,688 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

  Popular in this category: (What's this?)

  #14 in

  Books > Literature & Fiction > Authors, A-Z > ( S ) > Snyder, Gary

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

29 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars "Drinking cold snow-water from a tin cup.", June 20, 2001

By	tepi "tepi" - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

Amidst the poetry of the Sixties, Gary Snyder's early poems stood out as something very special, and are still very special. In contrast to the obscure and convoluted writings of an assortment of neurasthenic, super-sophisticated, and compulsive scribblers, types so totally and utterly wrapped up in themselves that they completely overlooked that insignificant thing hovering outside their window (ordinary folks call it the universe), and whose work goes unread because it is largely unreadable, Snyder's work came as a revelation.

Here was a poet who was very, very different - a poet who, far from being totally wrapped up in himself, was instead wrapped up in the universe. He appeals to us because, being himself wholly in touch with reality, he helps us get back in touch with reality ourselves. Ego is put firmly in its place, opening up a space in which the myriad things can come forward and announce themselves.

The secret of how Snyder was able to do this, of how he was able to bring us, not yet another of those obscure, tortured and anguished sensibilities who were and still are so thick on the ground, but who brought instead a sane and wholesome vision of the world, is all there in the very first poem of RIPRAP, 'Mid-August at Sourdough Mountain Lookout' :

"Down valley a smoke haze / Three days heat, after five days rain / Pitch glows on the fir-cones / Across rocks and meadows / Swarms of new flies. // I cannot remember things I once read / A few friends, but they are in cities. / Drinking cold snow-water from a tin cup / Looking down for miles / Through high still air" (p.9).

Where did Snyder learn how to do this? The answer is that it could only have been in China. The poem is the perfect expression, in English, of that commonsensical attitude that grounds itself firmly in realities; that keeps ego firmly under control; that practises a reasonable, as opposed to an excessive, use of reason; and that is commonly found in the best Chinese and Zen poets.

To translate Zen-man Han Shan, Snyder penetrated so deeply into the spirit of Han Shan that he succeeded in becoming a sort of American Han Shan himself. The result is a poetry not of coteries, of academic and intellectual circles, of super-sophisticated and pretentious Ivy League graduates, but poems that have real meaning and that can be read with understanding and enjoyment by anyone

The poetry of RIPRAP and COLD MOUNTAIN, like the poetry of many Chinese and Japanese poets, is a wholesome poetry, a poetry that cleanses and refreshes the sensibility, and that transports us from the technoid madness of our own chaotic world to something more human and hence more meaningful.

There's real sustenance for the spirit in these poems. They're like "drinking cold snow-water from a tin cup." Readers would be unwise to pass them by.

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The book contains good early Snyder poems and fine translati, August 7, 1998

By A Customer

This book passes the test of time because of its taut poetry and insight into the link between Sndyer's environment in the Pacific Northwest and his inner landscape. The second part of the book is priceless. Snyder's Zen practice and skill as a writer and linguist make him eminently qualified to translate the words of the reclusive poet Han-Shan, whose poems ring true today. I have read other translations of Han-Shan but Snyder's is the best. Its paradoxes move us in our modern times just as they must have in early China.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Luminous early poetry and translations by Poet Snyder, September 28, 1995

By A Customer

Riprap lets us see the world with Snyder's vision back in the days when Kerouac was writing about him in the Dharma Bums. The clarity, straightforward diction, and simple lyricism that have continued to characterize his poetry are all here in these early poems from the fifties. Astounding visual quality. Life in the mountains, in Japan, on the high seas. Cold Mountain Poems are translations of Han Shan, Chinese Zen poet. Han Shan stands with John of the Cross in his ability to illuminate the spiritual path through lyric imagery. Snyder's crystalline translations reveal Han Shan to us face to face, today, not some old exotic hermit but a vital presence.