University of Pittsburgh Press, 1991 Paper: 978-0-8229-5448-4 | eISBN: 978-0-8229-7894-7 Library of Congress Classification PS3573.A4314M35 1991 Dewey Decimal Classification 811.54
ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | REVIEWS | TOC | REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
ABOUT THIS BOOK
Wallace’s poems cover the range of human experience: music, religion, sex, art, childhood, adolescence, nuclear war, illness, and death. But it’s in his wit and good humor, against undercurrents of sorrow and grief that best characterize his poetry: part Emily Dickinson, and part Harpo Marx; part Woody Allen, and part Robert Frost.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Ronald Wallace is the author of seven books of poetry, including: Long for This World: New and Selected Poems; The Uses of Adversity; Time's Fancy; and People and Dog in the Sun. His works of literary criticism include: God Be with the Clown: Humor in American Poetry; The Last Laugh: Form and Affirmation in the Contemporary American Comic Novel; and Henry James and the Comic Form. Wallace is Halls-Bascom Professor of English, Felix Pollak Professor of Poetry, and codirector of the creative writing program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
REVIEWS
“Being has ‘no unbearable lightness’ here. The poems are fat (a recurring word) with memory, love, humor (don’t miss the poem about poetry, ‘Building an Outhouse’), the world (the poet’s parents, wife, children, the goats, chickens, cats, frogs, fox). And there are many nourishing servings of sound and sense, all, as in the huge “The Fat of the Land,’ a feast set against ‘the noncaloric dark.’ And yes, there are, during this picnic of a book, times when lightning strikes and the hair rises.”
—Mona Van Duyn
“What a fine, true poet Wallace is! I recognize so much here with delight and am grateful to have it said at last.”
—May Sarton
“Again we have what we have come to expect with pleasure from Ronald Wallace: wit, intelligence, originality, and a growing and deepening insight into the mysteries of daily life.”
—David Wagoner
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
I.
Early Brass
Early Brass
Bluegills
Fresh Oysters & Beer
Birdsong, Anyway
Rebounding
Condoms
Camp Calvary
Smoking
Love and Sex
Bible Stories
Off the Record
Fan Mail
Speeding
II.
Breakdown
Breakdown
Onions
Hairpin
Headlines
The Poetry Report
At Forty
Turning Forty
Professor of Plums
State Poetry Day
The Dinner Party
The Hell Mural: Panel I
The Hell Mural: Panel II
Fortunes
III.
The Makings of Happiness
Building an Outhouse
Wiffle Ball
Basketball
Barn Swallows
Frogs
Fall
Poet in the Goat Yard
Roosters
The Fox in the Berry Patch
Apple Cider
Astronomy
Night in the Country
February, Full Moon
February Thaw
Prayer
Burning
In the Amish Bakery
The Fat of the Land
The Makings of Happiness
REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
If you are a student who cannot use this book in printed form, BiblioVault may be able to supply you
with an electronic file for alternative access.
Please have the accessibility coordinator at your school fill out this form.
University of Pittsburgh Press, 1991 Paper: 978-0-8229-5448-4 eISBN: 978-0-8229-7894-7
Wallace’s poems cover the range of human experience: music, religion, sex, art, childhood, adolescence, nuclear war, illness, and death. But it’s in his wit and good humor, against undercurrents of sorrow and grief that best characterize his poetry: part Emily Dickinson, and part Harpo Marx; part Woody Allen, and part Robert Frost.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Ronald Wallace is the author of seven books of poetry, including: Long for This World: New and Selected Poems; The Uses of Adversity; Time's Fancy; and People and Dog in the Sun. His works of literary criticism include: God Be with the Clown: Humor in American Poetry; The Last Laugh: Form and Affirmation in the Contemporary American Comic Novel; and Henry James and the Comic Form. Wallace is Halls-Bascom Professor of English, Felix Pollak Professor of Poetry, and codirector of the creative writing program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
REVIEWS
“Being has ‘no unbearable lightness’ here. The poems are fat (a recurring word) with memory, love, humor (don’t miss the poem about poetry, ‘Building an Outhouse’), the world (the poet’s parents, wife, children, the goats, chickens, cats, frogs, fox). And there are many nourishing servings of sound and sense, all, as in the huge “The Fat of the Land,’ a feast set against ‘the noncaloric dark.’ And yes, there are, during this picnic of a book, times when lightning strikes and the hair rises.”
—Mona Van Duyn
“What a fine, true poet Wallace is! I recognize so much here with delight and am grateful to have it said at last.”
—May Sarton
“Again we have what we have come to expect with pleasure from Ronald Wallace: wit, intelligence, originality, and a growing and deepening insight into the mysteries of daily life.”
—David Wagoner
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
I.
Early Brass
Early Brass
Bluegills
Fresh Oysters & Beer
Birdsong, Anyway
Rebounding
Condoms
Camp Calvary
Smoking
Love and Sex
Bible Stories
Off the Record
Fan Mail
Speeding
II.
Breakdown
Breakdown
Onions
Hairpin
Headlines
The Poetry Report
At Forty
Turning Forty
Professor of Plums
State Poetry Day
The Dinner Party
The Hell Mural: Panel I
The Hell Mural: Panel II
Fortunes
III.
The Makings of Happiness
Building an Outhouse
Wiffle Ball
Basketball
Barn Swallows
Frogs
Fall
Poet in the Goat Yard
Roosters
The Fox in the Berry Patch
Apple Cider
Astronomy
Night in the Country
February, Full Moon
February Thaw
Prayer
Burning
In the Amish Bakery
The Fat of the Land
The Makings of Happiness
REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
If you are a student who cannot use this book in printed form, BiblioVault may be able to supply you
with an electronic file for alternative access.
Please have the accessibility coordinator at your school fill out this form.
It can take 2-3 weeks for requests to be filled.
ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | REVIEWS | TOC | REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE