. . . if I happen to be around in another 30 years, I almost certainly will still have Lyric Postmodernisms on my shelves . . . [full article from 3/11/07]
Marjorie Perloff:
"Like the best of museum curators, Reginald Shepherd has trusted his own poet’s eye and ear in assembling poems by twenty-three of our best (mostly younger) poets—poets not usually linked, belonging, as they do, to different schools and movements. From Rosmarie Waldrop’s ironic prose poems ('I gave up stress for distress') to Cole Swensen’s elegant ekphrastic prose, from C. S. Giscombe’s minimalist geographies to Susan Stewart’s resonant mythic landscapes, the dominant impression—rare today—produced by this lyric assemblage is that of quality—the sure hand of those who have mastered their craft and can therefore Make It New. This is a truly exciting and memorable anthology!"
Charles Altieri:
“All the anthologies of contemporary poetry I know are far too generous. They seem incapable of excluding almost anyone who has gained any reputation, and then they have to compensate for their breadth by such scanty selections there is no possibility of depth. Not so with Reginald Shepherd’s Lyric Postmodernisms. Shepherd had the courage to select 23 poets—spanning two generations—then offer them enough space to provide statements on their aesthetics, display their range (including selections from long poems and uncollected texts). This anthology treats poets not just as makers of objects but as thinkers with visible and engaging projects, who bring lyric consciousness into almost every domain of active life. . . . Here “lyric” can have its fullest meaning only if there are many more than one postmodernism, as Shepherd elaborates in his brilliant and concise introduction.”
—Charles Altieri
From Publishers Weekly:
Poet and editor Reginald Shepherd chose 23 edgy contemporary American poets with inquisitive, postmodern attitudes toward poetry for Lyric Postmodernisms. . . . These poems—by Peter Gizzi, Brenda Hillman, Nathaniel Mackey, Martha Ronk and Marjorie Welish, among others—ask questions like “what is poetry, a looking out or a looking in?” This will be a helpful anthology for readers and students looking to orient themselves toward this vital American tradition.
From Library Journal:
Shepherd, editor of The Iowa Anthology of New American Poetries and the author of five collections of his own, here attempts to explore innovative contemporary poetry while providing direction and inspiration for new work that more explicitly experimental poetry would not provide. Each poet has been given more space than is usual in an anthology of this type, allowing for more in-depth selection as well as the inclusion of longer pieces than would normally be anthologized. Each section opens with a statement on poetics from the poet, which ranges from a straightforward statement of method, aim, and scope to a meditation little different from the poems themselves. While this anthology is perhaps too esoteric or avant-garde for acquisition by a public library, an academic library with a strong literary studies collection will find it a welcome addition.—A.S. Popowich, Univ. of Ottawa Lib.
