Synopses & Reviews
Ryan is a scrupulously observant poet with a gift for going for the jugular . . . His work is finely honed, provocative, questing, and humane.” Edward Hirsch, Washington Post Book World
Michael Ryans first collection in fifteen years shows the acclaimed poet at the height of his powers. Highlighting the wit and passion displayed throughout his career, Ryans latest work comprises fifty-seven poems from three award-winning volumes and thirty-one new poems. In both dramatic lyrics and complex narratives, Ryan renders the world with startling clarity, freshness, and intimacy. New and Selected Poems is filled with the stuff of everyday life, and as the New York Times Book Review said, it include[s] pain and fear but also surprise, joy, laughter, everything human.”
"New and Selected Poems reminds us how much we have relied on this poet to forge a path for us in plain style.” Carol Muske-Dukes, Los Angeles Times Book Review
"Ryan's poems have always felt as if they neded to be written. They seem to exist because of some pressure to respond, not because of a facility for language alone. This is a rare quality among poets. The commitment to it is as hard-won, and real, as any you are likely to find in poetry." David Rivard, American Poetry Review
Michael Ryan is the author of many acclaimed books, including three previous volumes of poetry. Among the honors for his work are the prestigious Kingsley Tufts Award, the Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize, a Whiting Writers Award, and NEA and Guggenheim fellowships. Ryan is a professor of English and creative writing at the University of California at Irvine.
Synopsis
Highlighting the wit and passion displayed throughout the career
of an acclaimed and masterly poet, Michael Ryan"s first collection
in fifteen years comprises fifty-seven poems from three award-winning
volumes and thirty-one brilliant new poems—poetry that, as the New
York Times Book Review said, "include[s] pain and fear but also surprise,
joy, laughter, everything human." A welcome event for his fans,
New and Selected Poems is also a great opportunity for new readers to
discover Ryan"s singular voice and heart.
About the Author
Michael Ryan is the author of three previous books of poetry. Threats Instead of Trees won the Yale Series of Younger Poets Award and was a National Book Award finalist in 1974; In Winter was a National Poetry Series selection in 1981; and God Hunger won the Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize in 1990. He is also the author of A Difficult Grace, a collection of essays, and a memoir, Secret Life. His new memoir was excerpted in The New Yorker and will also appear this spring. Ryan is a professor of English and creative writing at the University of California, Irvine.