Appalachian Elegy: Poetry and Place

Kentucky Voices

by bell hooks

Author, activist, feminist, teacher, and artist bell hooks is celebrated as one of the nation's leading intellectuals. Born in Hopkinsville, Kentucky, hooks drew her unique pseudonym from the name of her grandmother, an intelligent and strong-willed African American woman who inspired her to stand up against a dominating and repressive society. Her poetry, novels, memoirs, and children's books reflect her Appalachian upbringing and feature her struggles with racially integrated schools and unwelcome authority figures. One of Utne Reader's "100 Visionaries Who Can Change Your Life," hooks has won wide acclaim from critics and readers alike. In Appalachian Elegy, bell hooks continues her work as an imagist of life's harsh realities in a collection of poems inspired by her childhood in the isolated hills and hidden hollows of Kentucky. At once meditative, confessional, and political, this poignant volume draws the reader deep into the experience of living in Appalachia. Touching on such topics as the marginalization of its people and the environmental degradation it has suffered over the years, hooks's poetry quietly elegizes the slow loss of an identity while also celebrating that which is constant, firmly rooted in a place that is no longer whole.

Genres: Poetry, Nonfiction, Memoir, Feminism, Race, African American, Ebooks

84 pages, Kindle Edition

First published August 15, 2012

About the author

bell hooks (deliberately in lower-case; born Gloria Jean Watkins) was an African-American author, feminist, and social activist. Her writing focused on the interconnectivity of race, class, and gender and their ability to produce and perpetuate systems of oppression and domination. She published over thirty books and numerous scholarly and mainstream articles, appeared in several documentary films and participated in various public lectures. Primarily through a postmodern female perspective, she addressed race, class, and gender in education, art, history, sexuality, mass media and feminism.

Reviews

[Hafidha · Rating 3 out of 5]

Finished the book. The introduction was my favorite part. I found the poems too similar and too fragmented to really enjoy. The rhythm is very slow, like drum beats spaced minutes apart. I'll stick with hooks' essays.

[Ivonne Rovira · Rating 2 out of 5]

The redoubtable bell hooks, known for her work on race and feminism, also writes poetry. I vaguely think I knew that. I recently found out that hooks wrote one of the earliest books on teaching children who black, poor and left behind. What I didn’t know was that bell hooks was born and raised in Hopkinsville, Kentucky. I also assumed that she, like me, was a creature of the asphalts. (I’m a New Yorker now living in Louisville, Kentucky.) How wrong I was!

I stumbled on hooks’ Appalachian Elegy: Poetry and Place while trying to find a copy of her seminal book on education, Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom. How exciting to check the Kindle edition out of the library!

hooks’ introduction proved as lyrical as the rest of her work that I’ve read. Here’s an excerpt that revealed, in part of a single paragraph, how Gloria Jean Watkins of segregated, rural Kentucky became the iconoclastic bell hooks.

All backwoods folks were poor by material standards; they knew how to make do. They were not wanting to tame the wildness, in themselves or nature. Living in the Kentucky hills was where I first learned the importance of being wild.

Yet, too many of the poems that follow that sparkling introduction just say nothing, lacking the passion of hooks’ other work. The poems are numbered rather than titled, and numbers 9, 15, 23, 37, 40, 41, 46, 52, 54, 55, and 63 blazed, as you’d expect from the fiery bell hooks. The rest? Meh.

Please allow me to end this review with my favorite poem from this slender volume of verse. Would that there had been more of this caliber!

15.
pink and white oleander
not native to Appalachian ground
still here lies
years and years of poison
rebel flags
heritage and hate
in the war to fight hunger and
ongoing loss
there are no sides
there is only
the angry mind of hurt
bringing death too soon
destroying all our dreams
of union

[Jon Nakapalau · Rating 5 out of 5]

Simple poems that burrow into the heart - the triangle of culture, nature and politics is examined; each point sharp and cutting.

[Amy Imogene Reads]

This was my very first experience with bell hooks (!) Not sure if that’s a good thing or not—bell hooks fans please advise—as this slim collection of lamentations was a unique reading experience that I’m not sure I fully understood. I had a good reading experience and I resonated with some of the language, don’t get me wrong, but I didn’t fall over from rapture at the poems themselves due to their format and general sense of distance (to me).

I found hooks’ introduction at the beginning to be my favorite part of the reading experience—the deep dive into place, meaning, and the Black Kentuckian/Appalachian experience was wonderful to read and learn from. I would have read many more essay type sections from hooks on those topics alone.

Not rating this, as I find it’s almost impossible to empirically rate poetry.

[may ➹]

“wholly in this world of wonder / standing still / waiting”

I think the introduction of this collection had more impact on me than the majority of these poems, but I still appreciate the way these poems expanded my understanding of the people, history, and nature of Appalachia

[Rosemary · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful, haunting, sad yet peaceful poetry of the Kentucky wild areas, drying tobacco on the cover, fading from green to brown like the rolling hills. Each poem is a little breath prayer of fresh air, to history, to the land, the birds, the forests, fields and people, too.

[Alyssa DeFusco · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars. If you're going to read....an elegy....about Appalachia....might I suggest this one over certain others? *Cough cough*. In all seriousness, this book of poems was lovely and moving. The use of natural elements to establish a sense of home, birthright, and lament was really beautiful. There's an introduction about the importance of being wild and hooks' connection to her childhood that was really special.

[Jackie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked her introduction to her history and where these poems come from. The poems themselves were interesting puzzles--no punctuation, sometimes it felt like they could be read emphasizing different words resulting in different meanings. For maybe the first half I felt weighed down by the loss and grief she expressed for ancestors who had lost their land and freedom...in fact I put it down two-thirds of the way through because it was so sad. Then when I started again, I gradually realized there was more hope and healing coming through. Was that the author's intention, or was that me?? I want to read more of her writing.

[s · Rating 1 out of 5]

hooks does nothing interesting with language, relying entirely on scattered images and being much too direct with what she wants to say. the line breaks were dramatic and ill-placed and ruined any sections that had potential. i liked the introduction. she is no doubt an amazing essayist but i would hesitate to call what’s in here poetry—more like the bare bones of what could have been built into poems if she had the skill

[Caroline Hardin · Rating 4 out of 5]

bell hooks’ deep love and appreciation for our state while reminding us of its broken history is so stirring

[lily · Rating 4 out of 5]

language for nature, home, and heart
—living and dying and living again.

[gabi · Rating 3 out of 5]

intro is the star of this.

[Alyssa Martin · Rating 4 out of 5]

so good so vivid so WOW ,,, #48 was my favorite

“earth laments / cries out loud / that justice may come / that it is never too late”

[Andrew Zachary · Rating 5 out of 5]

bell hooks can do no wrong

[Hannah Azar · Rating 4 out of 5]

The intro was wonderful. The poem made me pause and consider Appalachia and race in ways I had never done before.

[Love · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'd like to be walking through the woods listening to these poems on audiobook I think.

[Sam Kuntz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Appalachian Elegy is a book of beautiful simple poems that follow bell hooks' (she doesn't capitalize her name) childhood in Kentucky.

These poems delve into the beauty and politics of the Appalachian Mountains in Kentucky.

My two favorite poems in this book are number 21 and number 47. Number 21 is about turtles floating on the water, being peaceful before white men come to industrialize the land and remove the beautiful moment from these creatures. I like this poem because it shows the beauty of untouched nature while also giving a message about how people are so focused on industrialization that we lost many peaceful places like this.

Number 47 is about wild turkeys strutting around and just being turkeys. The reason I like this one so much is because of the simplicity of it. It is not trying to be deeper then what it is. It is about a wild turkey, and doesn't feel the need to be more than that.

I love almost every single one of these poems, so I don't have much to criticize, but one thing that I found a little bit annoying while I was reading the book was the formating. Sometimes it worked to great effect and made the poems feel more open, but sometimes it made the words seem clipped and ruined the poems continuity. This is a minor problem for me, but I still noticed it.

The most enjoyment I got from reading this book was from the small simple things in the poems. Like in number 50, it says that we need to walk soft on the graves of the dead, and compares the dead to wildflowers of memory. It is a simple poem, but it made me sad when I read it. The simple poems had the biggest effect on me.

I am giving this book four stars because a few of the poems felt phoned in, and didn't mix well with the rest of the book. For example, number 65 seems very last minute, and not complete.

All in all, I enjoyed most of these poems thoroughly, but a few small things took away a bit from the entire book. I would honestly recommend this book to everyone who is reading this because of how deep and thought through most of the poems are.

-Sam Kuntz

[maria · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Poems of lamentation allow the melancholic loss that never truly disappears to be given voice. Like a slow solemn musical refrain played again and again, they call us to remember and mourn, to know again that as we work for change our struggle is also a struggle of memory against forgetting.” (An excerpt from the introduction of APPALACHIAN ELEGY by bell hooks)

APPALACHIAN ELEGY: Poetry and Place by bell hooks is a poetry collection inspired the author’s childhood spent in the backwoods of Kentucky. The poems echo voices of hope and a renewed, meaningful sense of connection to nature. The poems also echo voices of sorrow, connecting a painful historical past due to war over the land and all other human conditions. The poems on grief and loss were what I held on to most.

Last month, I lost someone very close and important to me and in my inability to cope, I felt destroyed. My heart was fucking broken from longing for her and trying to accept the permanence of not being able to embrace her again. Though I’ve reached out to other family members, I had a really hard time not being able to physically sit with them and connect in that way. I really didn’t know how to help myself heal.

Then, I picked this book up and THE COLLECTED POEMS OF AUDRE LORDE and I realized I’m able to find some peace in specific poems (swipe for the ones from this collection).

bell hooks opened my perspective helped me climb out of the misery I was dwelling in. bell hooks opened me to think that seeds sowed are like dead loved ones who have been buried or whose ashes have been spread. Beauty rises from the earth -from these seeds- into flowers, trees, different kind of plants. Nature reminds us that there are signs of the dead everywhere. Their spirit is preserved in nature. There is hope for reincarnation.

I highly recommend this to anyone struggling with grief and loss and to anyone who’s craving to (re)connect with nature.

[Blaire Malkin · Rating 4 out of 5]

These poems capture both the beauty of the land as well as the despair. Though repetitive each poem shows a reflection of emotion in looking at the appalachian landscape.

From poem4:

to turn the ground over
to shovel and sift
until history
rewritten resurrected
returns to its rightful owners
a past to claim
yet another stone lifted to
throw against the enemy
making way for new endings
random seeds
spreading over the hillside
wild roses
come by fierce wind and hard rain
unleashed furies
here in this touched wood
a dirge a lamentation
for earth to live again
earth that is all at once a grave
a resting place a bed of new beginnings
avalanche of splendor

From poem 48:

48. Sunken faces
a collapsing gray
Shutting down
Still bodies
Standing in doorways
Sitting on
Falling down front porches
On crooked steps
….
Outsiders come
Taking land
Taking life…
Leaving in this corrupt wake
Souls grieving
Earth laments
Cries out loud
That justice may come
That it is never too late

From

[Kathryn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Simple, spare, meditative poems about the land that are rich with imagery, anger, spirit, and hope.

[Cameron Dickey · Rating 3 out of 5]

Small collection of beautiful poems! bell hooks is my idol (only complaint was that the structure of the poems were very similar so it felt very repetitive)

[Holly · Rating 4 out of 5]

Poetry collections like this are really nice to read while you are trying to get a baby to sleep while playing white noise on your phone.

[Julie]

no rating, i'm simply honored to have read it

[Jocelyn Chin · Rating 3 out of 5]

gonna stick to her essays. the poetry did not feel intentional or worked through

[Rachael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Appalachian Elegy is a great example of a whole that's greater than the sum of its parts. There were few individual poems that stuck out to me, but the consistent style and interlocking motifs created a focused, engaging collection.

[Nathan Albright · Rating 1 out of 5]

Being familiar with at least some of the poet's other work [1] is both an advantage and disadvantage in a book like this.  The advantage is that one knows something about the author's political worldview, which is in full evidence here.  The disadvantage, though, is that one reads this book with a confidence that one will dislike it strongly.  To be fair, there are poets whose work I greatly appreciate despite a distance between my worldview and theirs.  I am rapturously fond, for example, of the poet William Stafford [2] despite full awareness that his worldview and mine are quite different, although there are some points of intersection between them in our shared concern for the coercive power of the state and an opposition to service in the armed forces.  With Bell Hooks, though (who prefers not to capitalize her name, a convention I do not respect), the issue of her writing is that she claims to be above and beyond race when her writing indicates otherwise.  It is her lack of honesty and integrity that makes her work less than enjoyable and those tendencies are in full evidence here despite the fact that the author's reflections on hillbilly Kentucky life and my own early childhood in rural Pennsylvania and later in rural Florida are not particularly dissimilar, race and gender aside.  And that is precisely the point of disconnect.

This particular mercifully short volume begins inauspiciously with the author reflecting in her turgid prose on her childhood and on the way that she completely failed to identify with her poor white neighbors or the poor whites of Appalachian Eastern Kentucky because they were white and she was not.  The rest of the book goes downhill from there in looking at her execrable poetry which continually reflects on issues of memory and betrayal and shows the author completely unable to rise above the prison of her background and experiences.  She invokes Buddha, shows a marked preference for animals to people, and finds even the white snow to be oppressive in its whiteness, suggesting a sort of mental and moral pathology on the part of the poetess.  Most of the poems themselves are composed of fragments that lack linking words and expressions, and none of the words have capitalization so the writing does not come off as well as it otherwise would.  The perspective can be compared to a broken person trying to pretend that she is not broken but confident and strong, someone whose past is omnipresent but who is self-deceived into thinking that she has moved on.

The author could be pitied for this perspective, if she was not so determinedly hostile to me as a reader on identity grounds.  What is most striking about the author's self-deception is not her misguided belief that she has overcome the wrongs she believes herself to have suffered personally or ancestrally, but that in her writings about Appalachian life she appears to be particularly blind to the indigenous inhabitants of the land who were dispossessed so that she could have her rural Kentucky childhood, as while there are many reflections on animals escaping from Daniel Boone or running wild and free as the author would like to, there are few reflections on the fact that the author too (and not only she criticizes) is a child of privilege that she does not recognize nor has she done anything to deserve.  The author's total inability to reflect upon the way that she too is the descendant of those who have benefited from injustice and not only suffered from it makes these works intensely hypocritical.  And when the poetry is so poor from a technical perspective, it cannot bear the added weight of having to be judged as lacking because of the moral blindness of its self-righteous creator on top of its failure as poetry.

[1] See, for example:

https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2017...

[2] See, for example:

https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2016...

https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2014...

https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2014...

https://edgeinducedcohesion.blog/2014...

[Jo · Rating 5 out of 5]

I LOVED this book! The Introduction: On Reflection and Lamentation was exceptional. It begins, "Sublime silence surrounds me. I have walked to the top of the hill, plopped myself down to watch the world around me. I have no fear here, in this world of trees, weeds, and growing things. This is the world I was born into: a world of wild things..." A deeply felt, resonant essay about place, the perfect prelude to her poems, so many of which caught my breath, caught me.

One of so many splendid ones:

46.

overlooking water
I stand
at the top of the hill
looking out
see swans on the lake
grand plumage
more elegant than peacocks
their presence mysterious
all secrecy
how came they
to choose Appalachia
gracing us with their vision
as we climb down
to be close to such beauty
that it may open our hearts
show us such love
as to offer
no turning back

[Patricia Murphy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Day 11 of #TheSealyChallenge 2021 is Appalachian Elegy by bell hooks published by University Press of Kentucky.

hooks writes with deep feeling about the land of her childhood. These lyric lamentations conjure not just place but history.

Some of my favorite moments:

To be raised in a world where crops grown by the hands of loved ones is to experience an intimacy with earth and home that is lost when everything is out there, somewhere away from home, waiting to be purchased.

this earth I stand on belongs to the many dead

when home cracks and breaks and falls all life becomes danger

in the gray blue wash of dawn sacred secrets no longer hidden make tapestries of repressed memories

nature demands amends spirit guides me to take back the land

[michelle · Rating 2 out of 5]

i wanted to like this but i ended up reading it just to finish it. too choppy for my liking and although, as other reviewers have said, that may have been a stylistic choice to reflect an appalachian pace of life, it did not appeal to me. i saw some reviewers saying this reads as one long poem; to me they were more standalones that kind of just tied into each other. i was hoping that hooks' poetry would give me more context into her own past than this brought me but i don't even really know how to read poetry anyway

[canary · Rating 3 out of 5]

In her introduction, bell hooks taught me something conversations around my Appalachian identity often deny: self-love. I remember reading the first paragraph for the first time, and my heart suddenly hurting, bursting and glowing all at once. hooks writes about an Appalachia that is free, independent and strong. She writes about an Appalachia that is hers, ours, and belonging to no one at the same time. This book, specifically introduction, is a must-read for any Appalachian person. It is an embrace; a coddle. We are so lucky to have bell hooks.