[New-Poetry] Re: Kicking & Screaming

[David Graham]

Albert Goldbarth would be on my list, too.  One of his early books  
sat on my shelf mostly unread for many years, and of course I would  
see his stuff in journals as it poured out at an alarming rate.  But  
a few years ago I suddenly clicked with him, and now he's one of my  
favorites.  It occurred to me at one point a few years back that I  
hadn't actually read a whole book of his in many years, and that he  
had published dozens that I'd never seen.  So I started nosing around  
the used bookshops and acquired a nice little Goldbarth collection.   
Sometimes I wonder if anyone besides Albert himself has read *all* of  
Goldbarth. . . .

Since I've already posted about his work a # of times on this list,  
and since I too am a bit busy right now, I'll beg your indulgence to  
re-post something I wrote a couple years back about what I see in  
Goldbarth.

(Would also love to see this thread continue.  Thanks, Jeff. . . .)


Subject: [New-Poetry] Taking Goldbarth's measure
Date: Thursday, August 24, 2006 8:35 AM
From: David Graham <grahamd at ripon.edu>
Reply-To: "NewPoetry: Contemporary Poetry News &amp; Views" <new- 
poetry at wiz.cath.vt.edu>
To: "NewPoetry: Contemporary Poetry News &amp; Views" <new- 
poetry at wiz.cath.vt.edu>
Conversation: [New-Poetry] Taking Goldbarth's measure

Some quick pre-teaching thoughts on Goldbarth.

I'd read Goldbarth for years, of course, since he's been so  
prominently available.  It was pretty piecemeal, however; I saw him  
often enough in the journals, but I owned only a selected edition  
from 1983.

And mostly I shared the common admiration for his skills as well as  
the reservations about his work that Jim Finnegan mentions.   
Recently, though, I have actually given his works a more serious  
look, realizing (among other things) that the two or three books I'd  
read over the years represented the merest fraction of his  
astonishing total output.  So, with the help of libraries & some used  
bookstores, I located more of his often out-of-print work and dug  
in.  (I still haven't even come close to reading half of his poetry,  
much less his essays and fiction.)

I'm not saying the the reservations don't still apply; but I'm  
minding them less and less.  Maybe I'm teaching myself how to read  
Goldbarth.  For me it's like diving into the minor works of some 19th  
Century novelist; after a while even the flaws start to seem  
charming, and the prodigious length of the books becomes more of a  
luxury than a trial.

And one thing I'm learning is that, although there *is* a vast amount  
of bookishness in his work, a relentless scavenging among the  
oddments of history, literature, science, pop culture, and arcana,  
there's also a pretty broad streak of tenderness and lots of good-old- 
fashioned lyric pith as well as yarn-spinning.  Such things can get  
lost amid the splendors and challenges of his kinetic style.  I just  
read this morning from his book *Adventures in Ancient Egypt*, which  
despite the title and many apparent detours into history and myth, is  
largely an extended elegy for Goldbarth's parents.  The sequence  
"Semitic Rituals for the Dead," for instance, is really wonderful.   
At its heart is a little one-act-play in which Goldbarth has a  
conversation with his dead father.  It's glorious stuff--funny,  
tender, pointed, and the opposite of show-offy or condescending.   
There are lots and lots of such moments scattered among his books.



========================================
David Graham
grahamd at ripon.edu

Home Page:
http://web.mac.com/drjazz

Poetry Library:
http://web.mac.com/drjazz/iWeb/Site/DGPoLibrary.html
==========================================




On Aug 18, 2008, at 7:52 AM, AlMaginnes at aol.com wrote:

> This is a good question, Jeff. I have to admit that in recent years  
> I seem to be moving in the other direction--suddenly left cold by  
> poets who once meant a lot to me. But to answer your question, I  
> can think of a few right away:
>
> Wallace Stevens--two English degrees and I never enjoyed his work  
> until seven or eight years ago. Now I read him endlessly.
>
> Albert Goldbarth--how could someone that prolific be any good? A  
> source of unending delight for me these long nights
>
> Czeslaw Milosz--heard him read in the early 90's and was intrigued.  
> I've spent many hours poring over his work and while I'm not sure I  
> understand what he's up to a good deal of the time, I return to him  
> over and over.
>
> I'm sure I will have some other names to post when I'm not so rushed.
>
> Al
>

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