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Powell's Staff:
Five Book Friday: In Memoriam
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Every year, the booksellers at Powell’s submit their Top Fives: their five favorite books that were released in 2023. It’s a list that, when put together, shows just how varied and interesting the book tastes of Powell’s booksellers are. I highly recommend digging into the recommendations — we would never lead you astray — but today...
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Brontez Purnell:
Powell’s Q&A: Brontez Purnell, author of ‘Ten Bridges I’ve Burnt’
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Rachael P.:
Starter Pack: Where to Begin with Ursula K. Le Guin
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davidtaylor has commented on (2) products
Midnight Salvage Poems 1995 1998
by
Adrienne Rich
davidtaylor
, December 07, 2006
Midnight Salvage Andy Taylor Adrienne Rich?s ?Midnight Salvage? gave me a fair amount of trouble through the first half due to the fact that I had a hard time catching on to what the central points of some of her poems were. In particular, this occurred with the poem titled ?Midnight Salvage?. Though I enjoyed each entity of the poem, the combination of all eight parts did not make too much sense to me. This is because she jumped from talking about looking out of a window and searching for something that will not change to the fact that one can not eat an egg. Thus, I don?t really comprehend the major theme of the poem in its entirety. I do, however, love some of the language that she uses in this poem. For instance, her reference to Whitman?s ?O Captain, My Captain? in depicting something that seems a worse fate than death was really interesting to read. I had to read the part a couple of times to understand that she was saying her captain had not been murdered but rather was tangled up with a bad lifestyle, but once I got it, it really made me think about how there are a lot of things far worse than death (i.e. suffering, causing others pain, wasting one?s life/potential, etc.). Also, my favorite line of perhaps the entire book was, ?When I ate and drank liberation once I walked arm-in-arm with someone who said that she had something to teach me?. This line makes me imagine a two women walking together after a long night at a bar, or similar date spot, rambling about different ideas and such that they want the other person to know about them, and I love how she articulates it. Once I crossed the half way mark, the book seemed to be making more and more sense to me as to what the author was trying to convey through her poems. ?Seven Skins,? in particular, made me really feel like I understood that she was trying to depict how different things can be for someone who does not have all of the functions of what most would consider ?normal people.? The diction she chooses in this poem evokes such powerful imagery, as well, that I know what she is talking about without her having to describe each detail. For example: ?what a body ready for breaking open like a lobster.? That simile makes me imagine this poised form laying on a bed somewhere, waiting for that someone to come and be with them. It?s a beautiful image that I never would have gotten without that particular order of words. It is exactly this kind of language that makes the poem enjoyable for me. My favorite poem of the book, however, was ?A Long Conversation?, due to the subject matter of an inner-turmoil over whether to become what you know you will enjoy (i.e. being gay) or to find a place in society that suits the needs of those around you. It was really interesting to see the author reference the bourgeoisie and the proletariat as well because it added another element of how, at many times, individuals are thrust into their jobs by a social call to fill a vacancy. This is especially driven home by the line ?the proletariat is recruited from all classes of the population,? which makes me think of how anyone is susceptible to become a lower-middle class ?two-piece suit? (as Sam Taylor puts it) who shows up to work every morning ready to complete a task he/she thinks is worthless. I had to stop for a few minutes on this page as the language Rich used gave way to some of my own thoughts about my future and where I will end up. Will I end up a ?philosopher trained as an engineer,? who doesn?t follow a calling simply because it is deemed undesirable by my friends, family, society? It seems extraordinarily relevant considering the point at which I stand in my life right now, due to the fact that I will have to pick a major soon and set my bearings on what I would ultimately like to achieve. Thus, I enjoyed such a topic as the subject matter for her poem. Rich also made me laugh out loud with her line ?the Arts, you know---they?re Jews, they?re left-wing, in other words, stay away? It was fun to see that she managed to incorporate a political viewpoint about the arts into her poetry, especially since such a connection between the arts and liberalism is made everyday. Painting, music, art, poetry; all of these are considered, so to speak, hippie fields of work, and are often looked down upon, even if not intentionally, by those that have filled more mainstream voids in society, such as a banker or engineer(not to say that such people always look at the arts in a condescending manner). Therefore, I enjoyed seeing her provide a good representation of what society is like. I found Rich?s book well-written and thought out. Many of her poems were pages long but I managed to stay with them due to her interesting rhythm of writing that changed from page to page, as well as her vivid imagery used to portray the physical nature of some of her poems. Though I did have trouble understanding some of the major themes of her poems, I still felt I gained from the enjoyment of understanding the pieces of the poems that made the whole. Ergo, I would not say that my lack of understanding impeded me from taking pleasure in reading her poems.
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Body of the World
by
Sam Taylor
davidtaylor
, December 07, 2006
Body of the World Andy Taylor In the early poems of Sam Taylor?s book, it seemed that he had no hope for tomorrow. He repeatedly drew inspiration from topics that had a stoic nature to them, such as the poem ?ARC?. In this poem, he speaks of how the individual becomes just another unimaginative piece of the puzzle of the world. I feel like this is what he means by the line ?you will be a two piece suit between traffic lights.? To be honest, this train of thought thoroughly depresses me, since it is diminishing the potential and the creative individuality of each and every person to nothing more than just another drop in the bucket of the work force. He also leads me to believe that he has come to the conclusion that the world is standing still by the fact that he repeatedly makes long lists of simple, everyday objects. He does not give these objects life by showing their purpose through his poems, but rather sticks them out there as if to say that they are nothing more than another bland piece of society. For example, to draw from ?ARC? again, Taylor states ?the digits of pi will follow her down unrepeating streets past crates of oranges, gaping mouths of fish, into other rooms, books that you will never read?. This line gives me the image that these streets, though they may be different from each other, never vary individually in the day to day activities that go on there. This is especially true of the reference to the books that one will never read, since it seems to essentially be saying that all one has learned prior to walking down these streets is all that they will ever know. Maybe this is some grand metaphor for a loss of innocence through the process of maturing for the individual. Even if this is not true, I find that this poem and others at the beginning make me feel as if I?m trapped in something that I can?t get out of. Then I came to the poem ?John 3:16.? From this poem, I?m assuming at one point he was a Christianor maybe still is, though with a bit of spitefulness towards God. The body of the poem is a fairly clich? way of saying that God is letting his people down by allowing harm to come to them. The last line, however, is pure dynamite. ?Because the white light just goes on forever.? I don?t even know what to say to that. It seems like he?s telling God that he could forgive a few slip ups and maybe understand the fact that humans must endure some hardships before they can enjoy eternity, but that God?s lack of vigilance is so great that he can no longer make excuses for why God would not do something about the pain in the world. I this is how many people fall away from Christianity, once they find that they can?t come up with reasons for why God would put the human race through such terrors as, for example, rape. Though this poem may be depressing in nature like the others, it made me feel alive when I read that last line because I had to keep reading it over and over again to feel like I was grasping what he was saying. Why would he put it like that? On the one hand, he?s throwing down the gauntlet in regards to God. But then he comes back with this sort of lost last line that makes it seem as if he?s searching for an end. It shows that he?s still hoping there?s an out for God to use as his excuse for the evil in the world. Whatever the reason, it makes me respect him much more than if he had just said ?To Hell with God.? The second part of his book starts out with a poem that depicts the speaker as a witness of what takes place after a man loses his lover in an automobile accident. I enjoy this poem because it doesn?t focus on how terrible the tragedy was, while at the same time not coming out and saying that everything would be alright. It just takes the reader to the point where they start thinking about how they would feel in that situation and then ends. I guess I like this because it reminds me of one of those make-your-own-ending books I used to read in elementary school. Except this time, the scenario is something that I?m sure I or my loved ones will have to deal with eventually. In my opinion, this is related to the art featured on the cover of the individual wrapped in a blanket of color that makes the individual almost blend in. To me, this symbolizes that the person is lost for answers to a multitude of questions, symbolized by the many different colors, and that that individual is torn between different sides of himself, shown from the varying colors of his form seemingly stretching to different parts of the portrait. Thus, it portrays the man who has just lost his loved one, searching for an answer from the world as well as one from himself. It seems this could also be related to the poem ?John 3:16,? due to the fact that Taylor seems caught between his belief in God and his disgust at the state of the world we live in. Therefore, I think the painting is there to symbolize the many different routes, and thus challenges, a person can take in life as a reaction to the depression that dripped off the pages in the first few poems.
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