Book Description
Like its predecessor, Poem a Day: Volume Two contains 366 entries, one for each day of the year, plus brief, often amusing, always fascinating anecdotes and information about the poets and their poems. Drawn from the canon, translation, and contemporary poems, these works range in tone from tragedy to whimsy. Editor Laurie Sheck, whose own poetry has won wide acclaim, takes readers on a daily trip down the centuries and around the world, from the visionary style of Rumi to the challenging work of Brecht, from the socially conscious poetry of Gwendolyn Brooks to the avant-garde writings of Gary Snyder. Other selections include poems by Czeslaw Milosz, John Donne, Emily Dickinson, Langston Hughes, Raphael Alberti, Seamus Heaney, Marianne Moore, and many others. These poems are short enough to memorize, substantive enough to bear repeated readings, and accessible enough to be appreciated by both new and seasoned readers of poetry.


From the Inside Flap
THE ORIGINAL Poem a Day has sold more than fifty thousand copies and is still going strong. It is a perennial gift-giving favorite and a word-of-mouth sensation among those who want poetry to be a greater presence in their lives. Like its predecessor, Poem a Day, Volume 2 offers a verse for each day of the year along with brief, often amusing, always interesting anecdotes about the poets and their poems. Laurie Sheck, a prize-winning poet in her own right, carries on the Poem a Day tradition by selecting a wide range of great poems that are short enough to memorize, substantive enough to be read again and again, and accessible enough to be enjoyed and appreciated by a wide readership. On the whole, Poem a Day, Volume 2 is a bit more modern than the original collection, a bit more international. Included are Elizabeth Bishop, Langston Hughes, Czeslaw Misloz, Emily Dickinson, William Carlos Williams, William Shakespeare, Emily Bronte, Rumi, Bertolt Brecht, Henry David Thoreau, Lewis Carroll, Yusef Komunyaaka, Octavio Paz, Adrienne Rich, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Walt Whitman, Rudyard Kipling, Sharon Olds, Seamus Heaney, Gary Snyder, Sylvia Plath, Tru Vu . . . the varied list goes on and on. Every day is different, a surprise, and an adventure led by a knowledgeable guide whose love of all good verse shines through on every page.


About the Author
LAURIE SHECK is the author of four books of poetry. The Willow Grove (Knopf, 1998) was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Her most recent collection is Black Series (Knopf, 2001). Her work appears widely in such journals and magazines as the New Yorker, Kenyon Review, and Boston Review. She has been a member of the creative writing faculty at Princeton University and currently teaches in the M.F.A. program at the New School. She lives in New York City.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

In times past, Americans with a love of poetry routinely learned by heart dozens of poems - Shakespeare's sonnets, stirring patriotic verse, odes to churchyards and elegies for the departed, the wit of Dorothy Parker and the music of Swinburne or Poe or Yeats. A Poem a Day includes 366 poems old and new, one for each day of the year, worth learning by heart. All share two things in common - they are short enough to learn in a day, and good enough to stand with the great poetry of the language, from Chaucer to Sylvia Plath. On most pages readers will also find brief, often amusing, always interesting trivia about the poets and their poems.

FROM THE CRITICS

Library Journal

McCosker, editor of the best-selling original British edition, and Albery, an American poet who changed 50 of the poems for this American version, have selected 366 poems-one for each day of the year-chosen for their brevity and, in the view of the editors, because they are examples of poetry "great" enough to be worth memorizing. In her foreword McCosker tells us, "To memorize a poem is much more than a mental exercise. Indeed, it is the only way to truly know a poem." A charming idea; however, the selection is almost entirely archaic: Shakespeare, Kipling, Pope, Blake, Whitman, Millay, even Chaucer. Contemporary poetry in general is poorly represented. Most of these poems rhyme tightly and use language of a distantly bygone era. And unless your circulation policy allows a patron to check a book out for a year, this volume cannot serve its purpose. Not recommended for libraries.-Judy Clarence, California State Univ. Lib., Hayward

The Guardian

"This book is a dream, a revivalist campaign, a challenge, a book of days and an anthology, all in one."

The Times