Braided River

by Anselm Hollo

Braided River is a selection from forty years of published poems plus some of my most recent, uncollected work. It describes a lifetime's endeavours to write poems that reflect a thinking and feeling person's twentieth century existence in Europe and America - in love and sorrow, and even, still, some hope for the future of the world at large.

Genres: Poetry

260 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2005

About the author

Anselm Paul Alexis Hollo was a Finnish poet and translator. He lived in the United States from 1967 until his death in January of 2013.

Paavo Anselm Aleksis Hollo was born in Helsinki, Finland. His father, Juho Aukusti Hollo (1885–1967) — who liked to be known as "J. A." Hollo — was Professor of Philosophy at the University of Helsinki, an essayist, and a major translator of literature into Finnish. His mother was Iris Antonina Anna Walden, a music teacher and daughter of organic chemist Paul Walden. He lived for eight years in the United Kingdom producing three children: Hannes, Kaarina, and Tamsin, with his first wife, poet Josephine Clare. He was a permanent resident in the United States from the late 1960s until his death. At the time of his death and he resided in Boulder, Colorado with his second wife, artist Jane Dalrymple-Hollo.

Hollo published more than forty titles of poetry in the UK and in the US, in a style strongly influenced by the American beat poets.

In 1965, Hollo performed at the "underground" International Poetry Incarnation, London. In 2001, poets and critics associated with the SUNY Buffalo POETICS list elected Hollo to the honorary position of "anti-laureate", in protest at the appointment of Billy Collins to the position of Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress.

Hollo translated poetry and belles-lettres from Finnish, German, Swedish and French into English. He was one of the early translators of Allen Ginsberg into German and Finnish.

Hollo taught creative writing in eighteen different institutions of higher learning, including SUNY Buffalo, the Iowa Writers' Workshop, and the University of Colorado at Boulder. Since 1985, he has taught in the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa University, where he held holds the rank of Full Professor.[2]

Hollo became ill, and during the summer of 2012, had brain surgery.

Several of his poems have been set into music by pianist and composer Frank Carlberg.

Poets Ted Berrigan and Alice Notley named their son Anselm Berrigan after Hollo.

Hollo died from post operative pneumonia on January 29, 2013 at the age of 78.

Reviews

[Jeffrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Anselm, at least in his later work which I admire, integrates the different literary forces within himself—poetry, translator, critic, scholar—into the sonnet, that ancient traditional form that in the hands of avant-gardists like Ted Berrigan, moved poetry into a new world.
Hollo is part of that new world though quite distinct. Being Finnish by birth, and having written poetry in English in Britain before coming to the States and landing his dream job at Naropa, his background is somewhat less typical than an English language poet on the rise. Little wonder his work reflects his cosmopolitan, scholarly background (though his “borrowed lines” from his extensive reading are more reflective and gentle than the overbearing Pound).
There’s a lot of good poetry here and a few great ones, as it should be: Great poems in this age of disposable reproduction are hard to find. Too many pieces reflect aspirations rather than the muse writing the poet. Anselm Hollo achieved wisdom in his time, and like a searchlight swing about in the darkness, he lights up the moment and the reader sees a vision of transcendent clarity.

[Lianne · Rating 4 out of 5]

i liked/connected with the first half much more than the last. dense with allusions at times, but hollo's humor and cinematic descriptions cut through to make it well worth reading.