Descartes' Loneliness

by Allen R. Grossman

A new, breakthrough collection by "one of our most disturbing and humanly gifted poets" (Harold Bloom). Allen Grossman's newest work Descartes' Loneliness blends the comic and tragic. As the writer Ha Jin once wrote, it is "remarkable for the stout spirit of the speaker who dares to be funny while tackling such an austere subject as death." Poems such as "The Famished Dead," where the poet is visited by lost loved ones, "one at a time," confirm Jorie Graham's observation that "from the bottom reaches of the underworld, to the elevations from which one need cry to be heard―Grossman invents such peace as Poetry can invent."

Genres: Poetry

76 pages, Paperback

First published December 15, 2007

Reviews

[Kent · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am in love with the poem, "How the Cathedral Fell"! Seriously. I'm also fascinated with the role every poem plays in the speaker's pursuit to understand being. As in, where does being begin? Does it start in nature? How do people start in and participate in nature? And where is the divinity in this?

[Derek · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was introduced to this book by a stimulating discussion of "My Radiant Eye" on PoemTalk, Episode 96 (http://jacket2.org/podcasts/laurel-cr...). I recommend the episode and Grossman.

[Chris J · Rating 1 out of 5]

His poetry is uninspired, but he makes up for it by being abstruse.

[Brendan · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lot of rambling and strange tangents. In an intelligent way, but that doesn't necessarily make for poetry worth reading. There is one piece from a photo prompt, which is included. Decent photo, but it kind of seems out of place in this collection.

I found the following segments worth noting:

The last time I met my old girlfriend,
Emunah (the name means "faith")
was in a Jerusalem supermarket.
She'd married an archivist, one of
the twin sons of Schocken, the publisher.
She doesn't know her husband's name because
he doesn't know which twin he is.
At night
he fakes pages missing from old Hebrew books
by soaking xeroxes in tea - while his absurd
wife guards Jerusalem with an M16.
- "The Famished Dead"

I have made poems,
and written them down fifty years and got
just this far. Now, they talk only of war.
At midnight it snows across a thousand years.
- "Abide with Me. Fast Falls the Eventide...."