The Abridged History of Rainfall

by Jay Hopler

Jay Hopler's second collection, a mourning song for his father, is an elegy of uproar, a careening hymn to disaster and its aftermath. In lyric poems by turns droll and desolate, Hopler documents the struggle to live in the face of great loss, a task that sends him ranging through Florida's torrid subtropics, the mountains of the American West, the streets of Rome, and the Umbrian countryside. Vivid, dynamic, The Abridged History of Rainfall is a festival of glowing saints and fighting cocks, of firebombs and birdsong.

Genres: Poetry, Grief

96 pages, Paperback

First published November 15, 2016

About the author

Jay Hopler was born in San Juan, Puerto Rico. He earned a BA from New York University, an MA from the Johns Hopkins University Writing Seminars, an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and a PhD from Purdue University. His first collection of poetry, Green Squall (2006), won a Yale Younger Poets Prize, a Great Lakes Colleges Association New Writers Award, a National “Best Books” Award from USA Book News, a Florida Book Award, and a Foreword Reviews Book of the Year Award. His second collection, The Abridged History of Rainfall (2016), was a finalist for the 2016 National Book Award in Poetry. His third collection of poems was Still Life (2022). In his evocative and elegiac poems, Hopler engages the philosophical lyric tradition of Wallace Stevens and often draws on the tropical landscapes of Florida. According to poet Katie Ford, “Hopler’s vision and voice [are] both painfully complex because of how much of the world he allows to attach to him, to stake its claim on him.”

Hopler edited The Killing Spirit: An Anthology of Murder for Hire (1998) and, with Kimberly Johnson, Before the Door of God: An Anthology of Devotional Poetry (2013). He also edited and translated the collection The Museum of Small Dark Things: 25 Poems by Georg Trakl (2016). He received numerous honors and awards, including a Fellowship from the Lannan Foundation, a Whiting Award, and the Rome Prize in Literature. He was Professor of English at the University of South Florida until his passing in 2022.

Reviews

[Jerrie · Rating 5 out of 5]

These poems are quite beautiful, but often touched by sadness. The author struggles with grief over the death of his father and how everything eventually ends/dies. The language is lovely, though, and there is much here we can all identify with in our own lives.

[Ally · Rating 5 out of 5]

Throughout THE ABRIDGED HISTORY OF RAINFALL, Jay Hopler takes you on journey across time, space, and emotion - masterfully capturing the human condition and its impact on the natural world. The poems are full of grieving, wonder (and sometimes consternation) at the small things in life, loneliness, and birds. Hawks, roosters, crows, woodcocks, songbirds, chickens, you name it. There's even a poem, "The Ranges of Birds" that uses onomatopoeia to great effect in describing the sounds of different birds. These attributes are framed around lush descriptions of the interior and natural worlds, especially of locations in Italy and Florida. The wording is so vivid that I could quite easily picture myself in amongst them, smelling the fragrant orange trees and the knocked-over garbage in the streets.

There is a lot of darkness in THE ABRIDGED HISTORY OF RAINFALL, but there's also humor. One sense is really tempered by the other, in the same way that life can be bleak and still bring about silliness and laughter. There is also a strong sense of play throughout, especially through the poet's word choices, rhythms, and creative phrasing. This is an immensely beautiful collection of poetry, and one I know that I will return to again and again.

[George · Rating 5 out of 5]

Stunning. This will stay with me for a long time. I deeply regret not reading it sooner, when the poet was still alive.

[abby · Rating 4 out of 5]

inventive with language and form, had a great structure/flow, balanced humor and sincerity well. many many delicious titles and lines throughout

[Fredore Praltsa]

Hopler responds to the world's inadequacies with arch observation and, in the process, completely avoids the trap of melodrama—not an unimpressive feat in a book on grief. His humor is, in one way, an act of restraint (humor in general might serve this purpose ...). But sometimes I wished he would have restrained the humor, itself, a little—there are poems that became almost corny for me. His last book is better than this one, imo, because it tempers humor with a sort of grief-rage-joy that makes the poems feel elemental. Humor alone doesn't feel elemental—it seems, instead, detached by nature.

[Carolyn Hembree · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well written elegies. Bests his first collection. Stevens influenced. Most admired the cento, longer poems, second half of the book.

[Kristin · Rating 5 out of 5]

A breathtakingly beautiful book. An emotional roller-coaster. A symphony of sound that resonates long after you have closed the covers. This National Book Award Finalist collection of poetry is a gift.

[Jeff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jay Hopler's The Abridged History of Rainfall is a not intolerable translation of Gunter Eich's 1955 collection, Botschaften des Regens -- Messages From the Rain. The German title -- Hopler's poems are suffused with his love of German poetry, Rilke, Eich and Trakl, in particular -- is mentioned in the Hopler volume's second poem, "Where is All This Water Coming From," a title at least in part about German gutturals. In an interview, Hopler has himself remarked on his preference for these sounds: "I love the way [the German language] looks on the page, the way it sounds, the way it feels in my mouth when I speak it. It’s gorgeous and I love spending time in its company." Spending time in the company of his mother, in the days after the speaker's father's death, he observes her sitting down on a dull, rain-less day with a book. He is with her in the sense that he imagines in her backyard a blue jay "lights for an instant | on the back fence. Some clouds wisp by." An insistent move of Hopler's -- self-correction-- comes next: What is the relation of the jay to the clouds? Are they as smoke to either? Hopler tries out the smoke trope: "Or is that smoke? Some smoke wisps by." The smoke, however, imagines gunfire, so that, too, is implicated as part of the mother's setting, unless, "gunfire," too, needs correction, so now let's try that as a car backfiring. I imagine Stevens, by this point, particularly his "A Postcard From a Volcano," as a tutelary spirit of Hopler's mother's climateric, as Vesuvius prompted Stevens to render the clarified openness in the air "in Autumn, when grapes made sharp air sharper," so Hopler has that car backfiring like (associatively) "wet wood burning." So Hopler lets the rain's message play: "But that can't be -- . All day | The clouds have rolled their grim lead | Westward and left us . . ." - --And now he's with her -- "nothing." Together the bereft couple may play in each other's thoughts, so the speaker will imagine what the mother is reading, a German language text that does not yet exist in English translation -- call it, well, it sounds very much like the title of the book in our hands: "The Unabridged History | Of Rainfall." Just the one small correction there to make. Hopler's reader can do it, too, now, this openness, like the synaesthetically clarified air opened by that burning wet wood, that we see, at the same time as we smell it, the birds we expect to take flight as auguries of the filial identification: "No, it's Gunter Eich, | Botschaften des Regens. That book, when read | By a widow, in her house, aloud, and in German, | Makes a man want | To turn his eyes sky- | Ward." What's so lovely about this, and so sad, is that by this juncture of a tableau that keeps getting nudged toward fable, it hardly matters whether the mother's physical presence in the house reading damn fine German poetry is the poet's conceit or not, for one way or the other, we are there and have already partaken of that hunger, that homesickness, for the wood-wet rainless air.

[Jonathan Tennis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyable collection of poetry. My favorites were “O, The Sadness Immaculate” and “The Rooster King”. While “The Rooster King” covers a lot of ground (it’s 18 pages long), my favorite line of the poem and of this collection is “A dog can’t tell a lie; a cat can’t tell the truth; and people, at least the ones I’ve known, can’t tell the difference. That’s why I live alone. With my two dogs. That—, and because everyone else is gone.” (p. 57)

[Jennifer Longstreet · Rating 3 out of 5]

Such a hard book to review. A handful of the poems were very touching. The others just didn't do anything for me.

[Shaun · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jay Hopler’s sad lament over the passing of his father, Robert Sherwood Hopler, is beautifully written and beautifully packaged by McSweeney’s. Finished it two (2) days ago and couldn’t wrap my brain around a review that would do this little work of wonder the justice it richly deserves.

The poems speak of life, death and loss and the way we mark the passage of time after such loss. For example, in the poem entitled “Epigraph” Hopler writes:

Every year at about this time,
I pull the vines from the back
Fence, replace any boards that might
Be split and oil the hinges on

The gate, I cannot tell you
How many years I have done
This.

Last year when I did this,
My father was alive.

The mundane suddenly takes on biblical proportions while carrying the heavy, soul-killing cross of grief. Rain is the perfect metaphor for different types of crying or tears and, at the same time, life affirming sustenance that will surely bring resurrection and “spring flowers” after a long, cold winter. Very good writing and poetry here.

So far, this is my vote for best poetry book nominated for the NBA in 2016. Sadly, it did not win. Maybe Jay Hopler will write about the experience of being nominated but losing at the annual NBA banquet dinner and, perhaps, call it “The Unabridged History of Wind.” Food for thought there.

[Kristin · Rating 5 out of 5]

As an established "I don't get it" type of poetry reader, I feel most of the time like poetry, as a mode of writing, keeps me at arms length and leaves me going "sure, whatever." Is it good, or am I being overly reliant on the "right" people with "good taste" to tell me what is good? I hate the idea that I don't have enough of a frame of reference to determine for myself if a poetry collection or single poem is actually good. It's not that outside opinions or even expert options on something subjective are bad, but I like to at least be able to weigh my conclusions against them and feel I have ground to stand on my own conclusions.

The first two sections of this, I felt like poetry collections and poetry in general were finally clocking for me. I enjoyed the plays on words and the way symbols wove the poems together. of course, this is a McSweeny's poetry collection, so to some extent I know I am still relying on "smart" people to steer me towards "correct" choices, but I was able to delve into the poems and let them wash over me and appreciate the beauty of the English language.

Then came part 3. Woof. I once again felt myself held at arm's length from the poem trying to puzzle my way towards understanding. It was an exercise in perseverance, and I did walk away many times. It got less-bad the more I persisted, so I'm glad I came back, but I did roll my eyes a few times.

Overall, better than most poetry collections I have read, and I feel like it helped me identify things I might like and look for in poems, but I still harbor a seed of resentment for the rooster.

*Edit* The more I sat on the last poem and marinated in it, I really did appreciate it more. I really like contemporary art, and I am always annoyed when people write off an artwork just because it "doesn't take skill" to make it (not that all contemporary art is good, but I think you have to dig a bit deeper than that), so I do want to try to bring that attitude to poetry as well.

[David Anthony Sam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jay Hopler’s “The Abridged History of Rainfall” is a collection of good poetry: many fine lines and phrases, imagery that is true and right. Many of the poems have a clear voice that is one we want to listen to. Others play with archaic voices or the stylized voice of Wallace Stevens. Sometimes the poet seems to undermine his own poetic eloquence:

“A squadron of dragonflies is darning the darkening/yard” is a fine line, but the poet then says:

“Correction: a squadron of dragonflies is darning the air above the darkening/Yard” —- not as strong an image or conceit.

Given that these are poems mourning the loss of his father, some seem a bit precious and others a bit cold. Hopler is at his most eloquent in simplicity, as in lEpitaph”:

I cannot tell you
How many years I have done
This.

Last year when I did this,
My father was alive.l

Still and all, I recommend the collection. It is honest more than effete, precise more than ironic. How do you effectively speak the absence. “Abridged” is a game attempt.

[Kelli · Rating 4 out of 5]

“There is in this one voice such an intense loneliness,
only a downpour could answer it.” (24)

This is a devastatingly beautiful collection of poetry that revolves around loss, despondency, and grief. More, this collection feels like a fight against surrendering to the overwhelming flood of all three. Especially in the face of such great loss, such full emptiness.

There is this mournful melody that rises from between birdsong and crowing, between the downpour and the drizzle. It’s a painfully familiar sound and it is captured so vividly and so viscerally in this collection.

Definitely recommend!

[Matt · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another book of long lined poems. I'll admit I was curious what a McSweeney's poetry book would look like, and this is what I'd guess-- abstract, playful, and kind of empty.

The poems are rangy and aspire to a kind of mystical- spiritual thing that didn't do anything for me. But your mileage may vary.

[Casey]

Not rating cause some of the poems I couldn’t get to format properly in the app and for some of them the notes at the end recontextualized some poems in ways I didn’t like? Like I wanted those notes before reading them

[Kim · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good correction to read on a rainy day, when your heart feels achy.

[Scotty · Rating 5 out of 5]

i think the devotional/elegiacal form of poetry might be the only kind i can really vibe with.

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

A strong collection of poems arising from travels as the poet mourns his father. The movement through the world captures some of the feeling of the poet's loss as he navigates life after his father.

[Kati · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book, but almost none of the poems grabbed me. It could be about the space I am in though.

[Muhammad Rajab Al-mukarrom · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s good but not a fan of it.

[Frederick Gault · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good poetry that packs a punch.

[Ron Mohring · Rating 5 out of 5]

Isn't there a bird, somewhere, whose call sounds like i'msorry, i'msorry?

What silence is there deep enough
To follow a cry like that?

["The Coast Road"]

[Leonard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nicely written poems.

[Jeremy · Rating 2 out of 5]

“Winter Night Full of Stars” / “Where Is All This Water Coming From?” / “O, The Sadness Immaculate” / “Poem Written on the First Anniversary of My Father’s Death” / “Sonnet on Consequence” / “The Grove” / “Epigraph” / “The Coast Road”

[Christopher Soriano-Palma · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautiful collection of poems dealing primarily with grief. I couldn't put it down nor did I want to.

[Andrew Coltrin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful sad poems. Turns of phrase in titles and lines made me laugh. Made me remember that laughing is good for pain. We all have things to morn. Someday, like the author's has done, my own father will also pass and I will hope to remember to laugh.

[Tiffany · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mr. Hopler is clever, lyrical, angry, and melancholy. His sense of loss is palpable. His fu** it attitude is on full display. I found myself reading and re-reading some poems aloud because the rhyming scheme was pleasing to the ear even if the words were a total downer. I would read more poetry of his if I come across it. He has a compelling way about him.

[Larry Olson · Rating 5 out of 5]

A poignant and beautiful exploration of grief and how we learn to cope with it.

[Claire · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 really. A few gems in here.