Animal Poems

by John Hollander (Editor), Robert Frost, William Shakespeare

An anonymous Anglo-Saxon poet praises the whale. Shakespeare sympathizes with the hunted hare. Marianne Moore tries to catch a jelly-fish. Virgil and Emily Dickinson contemplate Bees. Kipling lulls a baby seal to sleep. From East to West, from ancient times to modern, from Mei Yu Ch'en on swarming mosquitoes to William Cullen Bryant's solitary waterfowl and Rainer Maria Rilke's enchanted gazelle, from Auden on cats and dogs to E.E. Cummings's verse in the shape of a grasshopper to James Merrill's vision of the octopus, here--selected by John Hollander--are 136 poems that provide exhilarating access to literature's glorious lyric zoo.

Genres: Poetry, Animals

256 pages, Hardcover

First published October 18, 1994

Reviews

[Jenny Clark · Rating 4 out of 5]

A nice collection of poems, some better than others obviously. A quick read, I took it to work as something to read on my short breaks. Recommend it for anyone who likes poems, or wants to get into reading poems.

[Sean]

My dog-eared poems:
"The Cow in Apple Time," Robert Frost
"Bat," D. H. Lawrence
"The Bear," Ted Hughes
"Snake," J. D. McClatchy
"The Toad," Tristan Corbiere
"The Crayfish," Apollinaire
"The Octopus," James Merrill
"The Kraken," Alfred, Lord Tennyson
"Leviathan," W. S. Merwin
"The Woes of the Crab," Anon.
"The Flamingos," Rainer Maria Rilke
"A Noiseless, Patient Spider," Walt Whitman
"Dragonfly," J. D. McClatchy
"Adam's Task," John Hollander

Which leads me to reflect: I am a sucker for a great last line. Kind of don't care what came before it.

[Yolanda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some new favourites in here for me, I think - and good material for classes I'm teaching.

Nice, also, to be reminded of Rab Burns' less twee poetry (I'm not a fan of the Haggis poem.)

[Kent Ellgren · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great fun collection of poems

[ARandomNugget · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked these poems.

[Zachary Weiss · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good collection of poems, so good and some ok. The one that stands out the most is The Mongrel by Thomas Hardy

[Christopher Ru]

the most boring book that i ever read