ALONE ON A WINDY RIDGE: I found

Thursday, July 31, 2008

I found

...All My Goddamn Poetry Books over on CanCult.ca. What an ambitious plan! Hm. I wonder if one of my Toronto connections will slip a copy of my book into the pile when Stuart's not looking...

*
Here's what came in the mail today.

A friend mentioned the work of Cole Swensen to me recently. I look forward to spending the next while with her book.

5 comments:

Shawna Lemay said...: you'll have to say what you think about the swenson - funny i'd just ordered the same book!; 3/8/08 6:40 AM
Brenda Schmidt said...: So far so good, so very very good. I've started the past few mornings with it. I look forward to hearing what you think of it.

I'm also into The Cellist of Sarajevo. My copy has this cover, not this one or this, and is unusually small in format, at least for a hardcover, giving it a special feel. A certain significance. It's a beautiful book. I have to hold it differently, which contributes to the experience somehow.; 3/8/08 9:07 AM
Brenda Schmidt said...: Or maybe I'm simply enjoying my time with the books. And with the cat who tries to get between me and the books. :); 3/8/08 9:38 PM
Shawna Lemay said...: the feeling of a book, the dimensions, the kind of paper, is SO important. i'll let you know when the swenson arrives - can't wait to start dipping into it!; 4/8/08 8:26 AM
Brenda Schmidt said...: And let me know what you think of the feel of the Swensen book. H thinks it feels unusually light in weight for a book of 100 pages and I agree. It's puzzling, as the paper seems a decent weight and the cover has large French flaps. But then I read "The Garden as Word Game" and thought wow, the book designer really nailed it. I'd like to think it was on purpose as a poem like this needs to be in a book that feels as if it could float off on its own power, and it is. I mean that in the best possible way. Can you tell I'm loving the book? Or maybe I've had too much sugar... :); 4/8/08 6:22 PM

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"This is a skilled poet having good fun, and inviting us all to join the party." - Shelley A. Leedahl, SaskBooks Reviews. Read more.

"Employing a variety of forms and the culvert stories — who knew? — of numerous people, she digs beneath the obvious roads to find out what keeps the water — the subconscious, the unconscious — flowing smoothly, discovering a variety of things about herself, notably the everyday masks we wear and the aging process we won’t always admit to." - Bill Robertson, The Star Phoenix. Read more.

"For Schmidt is indeed a poet. Readers can expect to encounter many visual and acoustic delights along the way, from internal rhymes to arresting images." - Trevor Cook, The Antigonish Review #196.

"In Grid..., Creighton's Brenda Schmidt turns a colder eye to the landscape than most other Canadian poets." - Jonathan Ball, Winnipeg Free Press. Read more.

"You can just feel the stones rattling off your undercarriage on this Grid." - Bill Robertson, The Star Phoenix. Read more.

"Like the Prairies, this is not a collection that gives itself away: the true beauty of this book lies in subtleties that may not be obvious at first glance." - Emily McGiffin, The Malahat Review. Read more.

"In Grid, moments are approached in their apparent stability only to be swept away in song rife with interruption and fresh stimuli, lending a new perspective. It is as though the familiar ground is an eye glancing back and the reflection only a nodal-point, open to opportunity and play." - Justin Dittrick, SPG Book Reviews. Read more.

"There is grit in these poems, so much that it seems unfair to think of them as nature poems; like the best nature writing, they undo our expectations of nature rather than uphold them." - Tanis MacDonald, Arc Poetry Magazine. Read more.

"In her fourth collection Grid, Schmidt’s wry humour transcends what we have watched heap up in Canada for more than a century—nature poems—balancing in canola fields between the beautiful lure of nature and our curious urge to separate ourselves from disappearing allotments of our own solace. We have wandered “off the grid” but fortunately Schmidt is an entertaining and insightful guide who can still find Li Po in a Dark-eyed Junco, if she has to." - Garry Thomas Morse, Jacket 2. Read more.

"These supple, witty, and incisive poems delineate our relationship to grids and systems both visible and invisible, natural and political." - Judges' citation, Saskatchewan Book Award for Poetry nomination. Jurors: Shawna Lemay, Barbara Nickel, Sharon Thesen.