Great Balls of Fire

by Ron Padgett

A reissue of the New York School poet's 1969 collection. "Padgett's volume is a work of wit, crackling and inventive."-- Yale Review

Genres: Poetry

96 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1969

About the author

Ron Padgett is a poet and translator whose Collected Poems won the William Carlos Williams Award from the Poetry Society of America and the 2014 Los Angeles Times Prize for the best poetry book. Padgett has translated the poetry of Apollinaire, Pierre Reverdy, Valery Larbaud, and Blaise Cendrars.

Reviews

[sarah · Rating 1 out of 5]

I can't wait to sell this book. His poems made me feel like I was spending an afternoon cleaning every spoke on a bike tire that has been caked in grime for five years. I read 40 pages through and skimmed the rest. (so if there are great poems after page 40 I'd really like to know) I respect his experimental qualities but didn't find any elements of surprise. I'm kind of disappointed, because these poems aren't ordinary. They aren't ordinary, but they feel like it, which turns me off because they don't feel sincerely ordinary, they feel like they were crafted and molded into something else. I guess I just don't really like his "jokey flowing word piles".

[Mike · Rating 2 out of 5]

A couple of these poems were very good but overall I found the collection just alright. Padgett is a great poet it's just a lot of this book didn't do much for me.

[Colin]

“There is no windshield” energy

[Eddie Watkins · Rating 5 out of 5]

Though I fear he's becoming a fuddy-duddy these days (it can happen to the best of us), these early poems flicker funnily with a wild abstract fire. Gorgeous jokey flowing word piles.

[Peter · Rating 5 out of 5]

'If it makes sense, it's not poetry'

Downtown NY early 70's classic.

'Sometimes there are no words but these to tell what's true'