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The Ruins of Nostalgia
New work from one of the most compelling and transformative writers of the contemporary prose poem
What is it to feel nostalgia, to be skeptical of it yet cleave intently to the complex truths of feeling and thought? In a series of 64 gorgeous, ramifying, unsettling prose poems addressing late-twentieth- and twenty-first century experience and its discontents, The Ruins of Nostalgia offers a strikingly original exploration of the misunderstood phenomenon of nostalgia as both feeling-state and historical phenomenon. Each poem, also titled The Ruins of Nostalgia, is a kind of lyrical mini-essay, playful, passionate, analytic. Some poems take a location, memory, conceit, or object as their theme. Throughout the series, the poems recognize and celebrate the nostalgias they ironize, which are in turn celebrated and then ironized again. Written often in the fictional persona of the first-person plural, The Ruins of Nostalgia explores the rich territory where individual response meets a collective phenomenon.
[sample poem]
The Ruins of Nostalgia 13
Where once there had been a low-end stationery store minded by an elderly beauty queen, there was now a store for high-end espresso machines minded by nobody. Where once there had been an illegal beer garden in a weedy lot, there was now a complex of luxury lofts with Parisian-style ivory façades. Where once there had been a bookstore and a bike shop and a bakery, there was now a wax museum for tourists. Where once there had been an empty lot there was now a building. Where once there had been an empty lot there was now a building. Where once there had been an empty lot there was now a building. Where once there had been an empty lot there was now a building. Where once there had been farms there were now subdivisions. Where once there had been subdivisions there were now sub-subdivisions. We lived in a sub-subdivision of a subdivision. We ourselves had become subdivided―where once we had merely been of two minds. * Where once there had been a river there was now a road. A vocal local group had started a movement to break up the road and "daylight" the river, which still flowed, in the dark, underneath the road. * Could we daylight the farms, the empty lots, the stationery store, the elderly beauty queen, the city we moved to? Was it still flowing somewhere, under the luxury lofts, deliquescing in the dark, inhabited by our luxury selves, not yet subdivided, because not yet whole? * Could we daylight the ruins of nostalgia?
What is it to feel nostalgia, to be skeptical of it yet cleave intently to the complex truths of feeling and thought? In a series of 64 gorgeous, ramifying, unsettling prose poems addressing late-twentieth- and twenty-first century experience and its discontents, The Ruins of Nostalgia offers a strikingly original exploration of the misunderstood phenomenon of nostalgia as both feeling-state and historical phenomenon. Each poem, also titled The Ruins of Nostalgia, is a kind of lyrical mini-essay, playful, passionate, analytic. Some poems take a location, memory, conceit, or object as their theme. Throughout the series, the poems recognize and celebrate the nostalgias they ironize, which are in turn celebrated and then ironized again. Written often in the fictional persona of the first-person plural, The Ruins of Nostalgia explores the rich territory where individual response meets a collective phenomenon.
[sample poem]
The Ruins of Nostalgia 13
Where once there had been a low-end stationery store minded by an elderly beauty queen, there was now a store for high-end espresso machines minded by nobody. Where once there had been an illegal beer garden in a weedy lot, there was now a complex of luxury lofts with Parisian-style ivory façades. Where once there had been a bookstore and a bike shop and a bakery, there was now a wax museum for tourists. Where once there had been an empty lot there was now a building. Where once there had been an empty lot there was now a building. Where once there had been an empty lot there was now a building. Where once there had been an empty lot there was now a building. Where once there had been farms there were now subdivisions. Where once there had been subdivisions there were now sub-subdivisions. We lived in a sub-subdivision of a subdivision. We ourselves had become subdivided―where once we had merely been of two minds. * Where once there had been a river there was now a road. A vocal local group had started a movement to break up the road and "daylight" the river, which still flowed, in the dark, underneath the road. * Could we daylight the farms, the empty lots, the stationery store, the elderly beauty queen, the city we moved to? Was it still flowing somewhere, under the luxury lofts, deliquescing in the dark, inhabited by our luxury selves, not yet subdivided, because not yet whole? * Could we daylight the ruins of nostalgia?
- GenresPoetry
80 pages, Paperback
Published October 10, 2023
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246 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
March 1, 2024
I’ve always found Donna Stonecipher’s discursiveness to be her poems’ core mechanism. The many versions of discursiveness. The conceivability that any subject, any stance, any frame can be considered and reconsidered in light of her own series of observations. It’s like what Martha Ronk did for domestic objects in Transfer of Qualities, Stonecipher can do for the concept of ownership or the concept of city or life of the sophisticate touring through Europe. Stonecipher truly gives air to what feels inexhaustible in this world.
It might be helpful to consider her work operating in two different veins. The first traced back to her first book, The Reservoir. Where details operate in a series of coincidences that imply a common concern or idea or sentiment. The poems in this case, I would argue, comment on the structure of logical thinking without a solid commitment to the subject of that thinking. It’s like the poems are structured around a constellation of details that relate together, but the poem is also going to experience that constellation in a sequence of associations. They’re poems that, for me, bring the writing activity closest to the reading activity, as I my readings feel like I am participating in the poem’s composition, by virtue of my attention and the microscopic shifts I feel I am drawn into. The sensation of reading that first book is seeing the poem’s center without having to be led to it exactly.
The other vein of Stonecipher’s work involves fixing a central concept. They propose a general subject and then centrifugally expand out into a catalogue of details that you wouldn’t expect to connect with that central subject. But the poet assures you they do. Mostly, I read this in Model City, but the lens could also be used for reading The Cosmopolitan. And especially in this book, The Ruins of Nostalgia. Though the discursiveness in this book becomes a little harder edged, coaxed more poignantly towards intention than other Stonecipher books. The poems I enjoy the most are the ones that involve her nostalgia for Seattle. Especially as she grew up there, and the paradox she addresses in all the poems (nostalgia’s intimacy both brings the world closer to a person and alienates the person from what they currently see in the world) feels more complex, because it’s not clear the poet knows how she feels about what it remembers that this past is now leaving.
There is a lot to explore for Gen X’ers and a collective nostalgia for the 1980s and 90s. Especially because it feels like what’s considered “old” is still referenced by the Baby Boomers’ lives. I appreciate Stonecipher’s approach to this position, and how circular thinking can better serve whatever people are feeling when they feel nostalgic. In contrast to, say, Brenda Shaughnessy’s So Much Synth or Matthew Dickman’s Wonderland: Poems, who supersaturate the nostalgia by framing the poems in a “I remember when…” light, Stonecipher reads for angles into nostalgic thinking, then comments on those angles. Even wondering what the point to nostalgia is even as she knows it’s inescapable.
It might be helpful to consider her work operating in two different veins. The first traced back to her first book, The Reservoir. Where details operate in a series of coincidences that imply a common concern or idea or sentiment. The poems in this case, I would argue, comment on the structure of logical thinking without a solid commitment to the subject of that thinking. It’s like the poems are structured around a constellation of details that relate together, but the poem is also going to experience that constellation in a sequence of associations. They’re poems that, for me, bring the writing activity closest to the reading activity, as I my readings feel like I am participating in the poem’s composition, by virtue of my attention and the microscopic shifts I feel I am drawn into. The sensation of reading that first book is seeing the poem’s center without having to be led to it exactly.
The other vein of Stonecipher’s work involves fixing a central concept. They propose a general subject and then centrifugally expand out into a catalogue of details that you wouldn’t expect to connect with that central subject. But the poet assures you they do. Mostly, I read this in Model City, but the lens could also be used for reading The Cosmopolitan. And especially in this book, The Ruins of Nostalgia. Though the discursiveness in this book becomes a little harder edged, coaxed more poignantly towards intention than other Stonecipher books. The poems I enjoy the most are the ones that involve her nostalgia for Seattle. Especially as she grew up there, and the paradox she addresses in all the poems (nostalgia’s intimacy both brings the world closer to a person and alienates the person from what they currently see in the world) feels more complex, because it’s not clear the poet knows how she feels about what it remembers that this past is now leaving.
There is a lot to explore for Gen X’ers and a collective nostalgia for the 1980s and 90s. Especially because it feels like what’s considered “old” is still referenced by the Baby Boomers’ lives. I appreciate Stonecipher’s approach to this position, and how circular thinking can better serve whatever people are feeling when they feel nostalgic. In contrast to, say, Brenda Shaughnessy’s So Much Synth or Matthew Dickman’s Wonderland: Poems, who supersaturate the nostalgia by framing the poems in a “I remember when…” light, Stonecipher reads for angles into nostalgic thinking, then comments on those angles. Even wondering what the point to nostalgia is even as she knows it’s inescapable.
February 19, 2024
“We were nostalgic for nostalgia. We missed missing. We longed for the longings of what seemed like long ago.” (59)
This is a beautiful and unsettling collection of poetry and prose meditating on nostalgia—the phenomenon and the feeling, the theory and the practice. In many ways, this collection felt confessional—like I was reading through someone’s diary. These poems felt like Polaroids—not necessarily capturing moments but capturing time.
Reading through this collection, I mostly felt sad. There are lots of reflections I could touch and see and hear—there’s a sincerity to the sentiment in these poems. I, also, felt this strong sense of bittersweetness. I miss the missing—but, it also feels good to miss the missing with someone else.
Anyway, I don’t want to rabble.
I appreciated this collection and if you enjoy more prose-type of poetry or confessional-esque writing, I think you’d appreciate this collection as well~
This is a beautiful and unsettling collection of poetry and prose meditating on nostalgia—the phenomenon and the feeling, the theory and the practice. In many ways, this collection felt confessional—like I was reading through someone’s diary. These poems felt like Polaroids—not necessarily capturing moments but capturing time.
Reading through this collection, I mostly felt sad. There are lots of reflections I could touch and see and hear—there’s a sincerity to the sentiment in these poems. I, also, felt this strong sense of bittersweetness. I miss the missing—but, it also feels good to miss the missing with someone else.
Anyway, I don’t want to rabble.
I appreciated this collection and if you enjoy more prose-type of poetry or confessional-esque writing, I think you’d appreciate this collection as well~
July 27, 2024
The queen of the prose poem returns with her densest and most reflective/complicated collection yet. Every piece ends with 'the ruins of nostalgia' and every piece looks back on the world, either with a magnifying glass or a thousand-yard stare. Like always, it focuses on art and architecture, culture and loss. One of my favorite living poets doing what she does best.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews