The Nerve Of It: Poems New and Selected

by Lynn Emanuel

Winner of the 2016 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize from the Academy of American Poets
Emanuel’s version of a “new and selected poems” turns convention on its head. She ignores chronology, placing new poems beside old, mixing middle and early poems with recent work, and liberating all her poems from the restraints of their particular histories, both aesthetic and autobiographical. Whether writing in the comedic drag of the cartoon strip, or investigating the Mobius strip relationship between reader and writer, or exposing the humor and hurt that accompany visitations from Frank O’Hara and Gertrude Stein, The Nerve of It both stings and pleases with its intelligence, wit and vivacity. It breaks through, in ways that are bold, sexy, haunting and wry, the die-hard opposition of new and old, personal narrative and linguistic play, sincerity and irony, misery and hilarity. Open the book. Something new is happening here.

Genres: Poetry

120 pages, Paperback

First published August 28, 2015

Reviews

[Matthew · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you enjoy poetry then I definitely recommend you check out this book. It's full of intelligence, narrative, emotion, wit. I'll be keeping it at the front of my bookshelf so I can read it again on occasion. And I look forward to whatever writing Lynn Emanuel publishes next. Five stars, great read. (My only complaint is that most of these poems have already appeared in previously published work)

[Erin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I admire the thought put into the order of this book.

With it being a collection of old and new, I imagine the difficulty involved as each poem ended, sliding into the next. Like when songs blend together on an album, outro to intro, it seems so seamless.

I think the author puts a lot of trust in the reader, and I thank her for that.

[Patricia N. McLaughlin · Rating 4 out of 5]

The work of an accomplished wordsmith, the poems holding “the whole great story” of the poet’s life together, some with the loose tacking of a seamstress, others with the fine stitching of a plastic surgeon. Eye-catching cover photo, fitting title.

[Julia · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love Lynn Emanuel's work and this New and Selected didn't disappoint. Normally I am not a fan of selected or collected anthologies - but Lynn has curated this collection and written new poems that toe all the sections together so sometimes it is hard to tell what is old and what's new.

[C. Varn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great introduction to a lively and compelling poet, whose work is both experimental and accessible.