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A Northern Calendar
Ira Sadoff's third book of poetry collects his most mature work so far. In an intense, wide-ranging meditative sequence, these poems chart the arrival and passage of the seasons, centering on time and location as the starting points for the imaginative act. The enlivening subject can be as local as 'the path/ of the old railroad tracks, / /just before light,' from 'January: First Light,' a brief but indelible poem of renewal; or as distant and desolate as 'sunrise in the taiga,' from Sadoff's homage to Kurosawa. Each poem in this remarkably unified collection earns its emotion through enactment, as a singularly humane intelligence transforms the seen into the felt:
...And like the water
stirred against the lighthouse wall,
breaking up, wave after wave, we
forget ourselves. Learn our place.
32 pages, Hardcover
First published August 1, 1981
3 people want to read
About the author
Ira Sadoff
22 books6 followersAward winning, widely anthologized poet, novelist, and short story writer, Ira Sadoff has published six collections of poetry, including Emotional Traffic and Palm Reading In Winter.
He has also published a novel, Uncoupling, and The Ira Sadoff Reader, a collection of stories, poems, and essays.
He has received Fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. His poems and stories have appeared in most major literary magazines, including The New Yorker, The American Poetry, The Paris Review, The Nation, The New Republic, Esquire, Antaeus, The Hudson Review, and The Partisan Review. Poems in Grazinghave been awarded the Leonard Shestack Prize, the Pushcart Poetry Prize, and the George Bogin Memorial Prize from the Poetry Society of America.
He has taught at the University of Virginia, the Iowa Writers Workshop, and currently teaches at Colby College and the M.F.A. program at Warren Wilson College.
He lives with his wife Linda and his two stepchildren, Casey and Julie.
He has also published a novel, Uncoupling, and The Ira Sadoff Reader, a collection of stories, poems, and essays.
He has received Fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. His poems and stories have appeared in most major literary magazines, including The New Yorker, The American Poetry, The Paris Review, The Nation, The New Republic, Esquire, Antaeus, The Hudson Review, and The Partisan Review. Poems in Grazinghave been awarded the Leonard Shestack Prize, the Pushcart Poetry Prize, and the George Bogin Memorial Prize from the Poetry Society of America.
He has taught at the University of Virginia, the Iowa Writers Workshop, and currently teaches at Colby College and the M.F.A. program at Warren Wilson College.
He lives with his wife Linda and his two stepchildren, Casey and Julie.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
January 22, 2008
Ira Sadoff, A Northern Calendar (David R. Godine, 1982)
Ira Sadoff is one of the finest and most underrated poets working in America today. Every book of his that crosses my desk reinforces this position. This thin collection (and one wonders what David R. Godine was thinking, charging $8.95 for a 32-page chapbook all the way back in 1982!) is as fine as anything that has come from Sadoff's pen before or since, at least of the work of his that I've read (some of his books are frustratingly hard to come by these days).
Sadoff's gentle, storytelling style, insistence on imagery rather than simple value judgment, and ability to get right to the point show what a poet who is academically-infused enough to nod at the canon in every poem and yet accessible enough for the common reader to understand what he's on about can do. And Sadoff is one of at most a handful of poets working in America today who can do so. Of those, he is arguably the best (Hayden Carruth also competes for the title with every release):
"Can you miss a place you've never been?
I remember waking once, the sharp chill
of Stockholm singing from my sleep, harbors
crowded with so many ships the water seemed
precarious, superfluous. I was waving goodbye
to my mother and thought only of my setting
at the table. My meal. How I wanted it saved."
("On First Sighting a Man")
Sadoff deserves far more recognition than he's gotten. As with all of the other books of his that I've read, this will both make a fine starting point for the novice and a pleasurable read for the existing fan. Excellent. ****
Ira Sadoff is one of the finest and most underrated poets working in America today. Every book of his that crosses my desk reinforces this position. This thin collection (and one wonders what David R. Godine was thinking, charging $8.95 for a 32-page chapbook all the way back in 1982!) is as fine as anything that has come from Sadoff's pen before or since, at least of the work of his that I've read (some of his books are frustratingly hard to come by these days).
Sadoff's gentle, storytelling style, insistence on imagery rather than simple value judgment, and ability to get right to the point show what a poet who is academically-infused enough to nod at the canon in every poem and yet accessible enough for the common reader to understand what he's on about can do. And Sadoff is one of at most a handful of poets working in America today who can do so. Of those, he is arguably the best (Hayden Carruth also competes for the title with every release):
"Can you miss a place you've never been?
I remember waking once, the sharp chill
of Stockholm singing from my sleep, harbors
crowded with so many ships the water seemed
precarious, superfluous. I was waving goodbye
to my mother and thought only of my setting
at the table. My meal. How I wanted it saved."
("On First Sighting a Man")
Sadoff deserves far more recognition than he's gotten. As with all of the other books of his that I've read, this will both make a fine starting point for the novice and a pleasurable read for the existing fan. Excellent. ****
Displaying 1 of 1 review