In her introduction to The Best American Poetry 2000, Rita Dove offers the key to honest appreciation: read the work for itself, not for its creator's name and rank on the great chain of poetic being. With luck it will take the top of your head off, though some poems may only elicit a tingle the first time around. Put those away and come back another time, in another mood. "A poem must sing," she writes, "even if the song elicits horror." And the 75 she ultimately chose--by such poetic senior citizens as Lucille Clifton, Thom Gunn, W.S. Merwin, and the as yet unacknowledged--both sing and explode. Her harvest is as varied and abundant as the garden (and gardener!) Stanley Plumley celebrates in "Kunitz Tending Roses": Still, there he is, on any given day,
talking to ramblers, floribundas, Victorian
perpetuals, as if for beauty and to make us
glad or otherwise for envy and to make us
wish for more--if only to mystify and move us.
Dove does find certain trends, ranging from "the interpolation of personal chronicles with the larger sweep of events" to "elegies for the passing of heroes, of good times, of innocence." Certainly, more than one therapist pops up here--in, for instance, Pamela Sutton's mesmerizing "There Is a Lake of Ice on the Moon" and in Denise Duhamel's intricate "Incest Taboo" (which is a lot more subtle than its title would give out). This dislocating double sestina's 13 stanzas juggle a fear of birds, a brother's death, alcoholism, familial expectations, and so much more. Set free by the form's constraints--the same end-words must recur in each stanza--this poet uses such phrases as "parrot," swoop," "wrong, "hover," hum," and "mother" to great effect, ironies and tragedies accreting. As Duhamel writes in the contributors' notes: "I felt as though I were doing a strenuous combination of math, crossword puzzles, and particle physics."

Some poems are definitely augmented by their creators' explanations--and their prose is often as eloquent as their verse. Others require none. Yet what threatens to steal the poetic show occurs after these comments. The series wizard, David Lehman, asked past and present guest editors to cite their top 15 20th-century American poems, in alphabetical order. It's impossible not to gravitate to this section and silently argue with some selections, approve others wholeheartedly, discover a few for the first time, and remonstrate over certain absences. How marvelous, if unsurprising, to see so many poets voting for Robert Frost, Elizabeth Bishop (who scores particularly high), and two whom John Hollander wittily terms "the transatlantic problematics," Auden and Eliot. If only Lehman had asked each editor to expound on his or her choices. In this list context, Louise Glück's refusal to "prefer merely fifteen" proves as inspiring as others' elections. Still, it's amusing to watch such poets as Mark Strand, A.R. Ammons, and Lehman himself look for loopholes and stuff the ballot box with also-rans. --Kerry Fried


From Publishers Weekly
Perhaps it is the too-familiar audacity of the title, or sour grapes over the always big-name guest editors, but no series arouses quite as much po-biz rancorAvociferous nit-picking over choices and kibitzing in generalAas this 13-years-and-running institution, overseen by poet and critic David Lehman (The Daily Mirror; The Last Avant-Garde; etc.). None of that matters to the many consumers who make this book their only verse purchase of the year, though, and this year's outing, edited by Pulitzer-winner and former Poet Laureate Rita Dove, should reach that target market nicely. Dove's volume improves over John Hollander's (1998) and Robert Bly's (1999) respective orthodoxies, but offers fewer surprises than those of John Ashbery (1988) or Adrienne Rich (1996). Dove is drawn to nervous, careful, archaism-strewn monologues (Erin Belieu's free verse, Denise Duhamel's double sestina, Mark Jarman's prose "Epistle"), and to fine but unspectacular work from big names (Carolyn Kizer, Yusef Komunyakaa, Michael Palmer, Robert Pinsky, Mary Oliver, Derek Walcott, Richard Wilbur and others). She includes outwardly comic, inwardly serious lists and invocations by younger poets (Christopher Edgar, Karl Elder, Oleana Kalytiak Davis, Dean Young), even-voiced reportage from global scenes of horror (Linh Dinh, Gabriel Spera) and reports from more quotidian trials (Ray Gonzalez, David Kirby), but there's nothing that absolutely floors. Fifty pages of contributors' notes and biographies introduce the poets and poems, along with introductions from Lehman and Dove. Most intriguing here may be the appendix, "The Best American Poetry of the Twentieth Century," which has all 14 editors of the series so far (including Lehman) listing their bests or favorites from the previous 100 years of poetry. The results will send many back to Berryman, Crane, Frost, Hayden, Moore, Stein and others, if not to many of the poets actually represented here. (Sept.) Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
Dove's edition of this distinguished annual neither ruffles feathers, as Adrienne Rich did in 1996 by deliberately opening the collection to minority voices, knocks your socks off, as Richard Howard's stellar 1995 collection did, nor induces somnolence, as some years' gatherings have. Instead, Dove's selection bears out series editor Lehman's optimism about the state of American poetic art at the turn of the century. For it includes Susan Mitchell's anguished and humorous "Lost Parrot"; Lynne McMahon's "We Take Our Children to Ireland," in which said offspring's most joyous discovery is casual Irish vulgarity; Julianna Baggott's devastating dramatic monologue, "Mary Todd on Her Deathbed"; Richard Siken's "The Dislocated Room," with its sinister aura and implications; and Pamela Sutton's extraordinary evocation of a northern plains childhood, "There Is a Lake of Ice on the Moon." And they are equaled if not excelled by many other poems, far from all of them by big-name poets, though those that are, such as Thom Gunn's and Mary Oliver's, are choice. Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


Book Description
A mid an "explosion in the interest of poetry nationwide" (The New York Times), The Best American Poetry 2000 delivers one of the finest volumes yet in this renowned series. Guest editor Rita Dove, a distinguished figure in the poetry world and the second African-American poet ever to win the Pulitzer Prize, brings all of her dynamism and well-honed acumen to bear on this project. Dove used a simple yet exacting method to make her selections: "The final criterion," she writes in her introduction, "was Emily Dickinson's famed description -- if I felt that the top of my head had been taken off, the poem was in." The result is a marvelous collection of consistently high-quality poems diverse in form, tone, style, stance, and subject matter. With comments from the poets themselves illuminating their poems and a foreword by series editor David Lehman, The Best American Poetry 2000 is this year's must-have book for all poetry lovers.


About the Author
David Lehman was born in New York City in 1948. Educated at Columbia and Cambridge universities, he earned his doctorate in English, taught at Hamilton College, then left academe to take his chances as a freelance writer. He is the author of four poetry books, most recently The Daily Mirror: A Journal in Poetry (Scribner, 2000). His nonfiction books include The Last Avant-Garde: The Making of the New York School of Poets (Doubleday, 1998) and The Perfect Murder, his study of detective novels, which appeared in a revised paperback edition in 2000 (Michigan). With Star Black he is codirector of the KGB Bar poetry reading series in New York City and coeditor of The KGB Bar Book of Poems (Harper-Collins, 2000). He has served on the core faculty of the graduate writing programs at Bennington College and the New School since the inception of both programs, in 1994 and 1996 respectively. He also teaches "Great Poems" as an honors course for undergraduates at NYU. A Guggenheim Fellow, he succeeded Donald Hall as general editor of the University of Michigan Press's Poets on Poetry series. He initiated The Best American Poetry in 1988.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

Perhaps it is the too-familiar audacity of the title, or sour grapes over the always big-name guest editors, but no series arouses quite as much po-biz rancor--vociferous nit-picking over choices and kibitzing in general--as this 13-years-and-running institution, overseen by poet and critic David Lehman (The Daily Mirror; The Last Avant-Garde; etc.). None of that matters to the many consumers who make this book their only verse purchase of the year, though, and this year's outing, edited by Pulitzer-winner and former Poet Laureate Rita Dove, should reach that target market nicely. Dove's volume improves over John Hollander's (1998) and Robert Bly's (1999) respective orthodoxies, but offers fewer surprises than those of John Ashbery (1988) or Adrienne Rich (1996). Dove is drawn to nervous, careful, archaism-strewn monologues (Erin Belieu's free verse, Denise Duhamel's double sestina, Mark Jarman's prose "Epistle"), and to fine but unspectacular work from big names (Carolyn Kizer, Yusef Komunyakaa, Michael Palmer, Robert Pinsky, Mary Oliver, Derek Walcott, Richard Wilbur and others). She includes outwardly comic, inwardly serious lists and invocations by younger poets (Christopher Edgar, Karl Elder, Oleana Kalytiak Davis, Dean Young), even-voiced reportage from global scenes of horror (Linh Dinh, Gabriel Spera) and reports from more quotidian trials (Ray Gonzalez, David Kirby), but there's nothing that absolutely floors. Fifty pages of contributors' notes and biographies introduce the poets and poems, along with introductions from Lehman and Dove. Most intriguing here may be the appendix, "The Best American Poetry of the Twentieth Century," which has all 14 editors of the series so far (including Lehman) listing their bests or favorites from the previous 100 years of poetry. The results will send many back to Berryman, Crane, Frost, Hayden, Moore, Stein and others, if not to many of the poets actually represented here. (Sept.) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal

It is remarkably difficult to assess and review far-ranging anthologies like this one, which includes dozens of distinct poetic voices but adheres to no single school, theme, or style. Still, it must be said that this series, now in its 13th year under the general editorship of Lehman, is one of the best things going in modern American literature, kept fresh by new and distinguished guest editors. Dove especially honors poets for "stepping into the fray of life," and her selection draws on both the familiar (Susan Mitchell, Richard Wilbur, W.S. Merwin, Mary Oliver, Thom Gunn) and the less familiar (A.E. Stallings, Juliana Baggott, B.H. Fairchild). The high points are too many to name, and readers will have different favorites. An added feature of the 2000 edition is a collection of lists by most of the previous editors--a kind of literary parlor game, to be sure, but provocative, pleasing, and a fitting cap to the last series entry of the century. Highly recommended.--Graham Christian, formerly with Andover-Harvard Theological Lib., Cambridge, MA Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

Anyone who reads poetry seriously and often will have consistent cause to wonder why the high points of their reading year so frequently go ungathered in this annual Scribner anthology. In truth, the interest of each volume lies mainly in what it reveals about the tastes of the guest editor. The poems selected here by Pulitzer winner and former Poet Laureate Dove are typified by plainspoken lyrics, works that are more often crafted and pellucid than ambitious or difficult. Dove's humor is anecdotal and easily shared; it relies most frequently on our common, liberal-minded sense of the absurd, and its favored ally is humility. (This is not true of Billie Collins's terrific "Man Listening to Disc," which features a whimsical Discman-strapped stroller: "The music is loud yet so confidential / I cannot help feeling even more / like the center of the universe / than usual.") It makes for an enjoyable perusal—there are very few genuinely bad poems—although not one especially full of either revelations or challenges. A few of the usual suspects are here (Ammons, Merwin, Walcott, and Wilbur), but many are missing, which allows a smattering of new voices to take the stage with mixed, though generally happy results. The volume also includes, as an unforgivable gimmick sure to be scrutinized with guilty pleasures, a listing of "The Best American Poems of the Century"—as selected by previous guest editors. As depicted in these pages, the State of Poetry at the end of the century, like the State of the Union, seems to be in disarmingly good health: if it is not racked with inspiration, neither does there appear any cause for alarm.Garren, Christine AMONG THE MONARCHS Univ. ofChicago (64 pp.) paperback original Sep. 2000