So There

by Robert Creeley

So Poems 1976-83 combines three earlier collections of Robert Creeley's work published by New Directions –– A Journal , February 29-May 3, 1976 (published 1978); Later (1979); and Mirrors (1983). This first gathering of the poet's later work continues but also stands in contrast to his early poems as presented in the monumental Collected Poems 1945-1975 (University of California Press, 1982). Few poets have so clear a demarcation in their work. In 1976, Creeley set off to visit nine countries in the Far East, to explore his sense of self in a foreign landscape. He found not only a "company" of fellow beings but also a transformed sense of life and subsequently a new family. He sees today that these three books in a single volume emphasize the "determined change in my life they are the issue of." They record a watershed period when Creeley "moved beyond his early influences to become a unique master" ( Publishers Weekly, about Mirrors ).

Genres: Poetry

248 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 1998

About the author

Robert Creeley was an American poet and author of more than sixty books. He is usually associated with the Black Mountain poets, though his verse aesthetic diverged from that school's. He was close with Charles Olson, Robert Duncan, Allen Ginsberg, John Wieners and Ed Dorn. He served as the Samuel P. Capen Professor of Poetry and the Humanities at State University of New York at Buffalo, and lived in Waldoboro, Maine, Buffalo, New York and Providence, Rhode Island, where he taught at Brown University. He was a recipient of the Lannan Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award, and was much beloved as a generous presence in many poets' lives.

Reviews

[Cooper Renner · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some fine short lyrics, but dozens of poems which could be excised with no loss. Creeley can be oblique and elusive, but usually in a philosophical or thinky way. Laura Elrick and Vsevolod Nekrasov are oblique and elusive, but much better, more entertaining, more interesting, more graspable.

[Russ]

another piece of the puzzle

[Abbi Dion]

Great cover art by Jim Dine. I used to read this while walking around campus in the late nineties. And again, now, while walking to work in 2011. "Versions" still resonates, more now, actually.