The Pupil: Poems

by W.S. Merwin

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author and “one of the greatest poets of our age … the Thoreau of our era” (Edward Hirsch) comes a volume of astonishing range and extraordinary a major literary event that captures the spiritual anguish of our time. 

Hailed by Peter Davison in the Boston Sunday Globe as a poet who “engages the underground stream of our lives at depths that only two or three living poets can match,” W. S. Merwin now gives us The Pupil. These are poems of great lyrical intensity, concerned with darkness and light, with the seasons, and with the passing of time across landscapes that are both vast and minutely imagined. They capture the bittersweet joys of vanishing wilderness; anger at our political wrong-doings; the sensuality that memory can engender. Here are remembrances of the poet’s youth, lyrics on the loss of loved ones, echoes from the surfaces of the natural world. Here, too, is the poet’s sense of a larger

... we know
from the beginning that the darkness
is beyond us there is no explaining
the dark it is only the light
that we keep feeling a need to account for
—from “The Marfa Lights”

Passionate, rigorous, and quietly profound, The Pupil is an essential addition to the canon of contemporary American poetry—a book that finds W. S. Merwin’s singularly resonant voice at the height of its power.

Genres: Poetry

112 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2001

About the author

William Stanley Merwin was an American poet, credited with over fifty books of poetry, translation and prose.

William Stanley Merwin (September 30, 1927 – March 15, 2019) was an American poet who wrote more than fifty books of poetry and prose, and produced many works in translation. During the 1960s anti-war movement, Merwin's unique craft was thematically characterized by indirect, unpunctuated narration. In the 1980s and 1990s, his writing influence derived from an interest in Buddhist philosophy and deep ecology. Residing in a rural part of Maui, Hawaii, he wrote prolifically and was dedicated to the restoration of the island's rainforests.

Merwin received many honors, including the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1971 and 2009; the National Book Award for Poetry in 2005, and the Tanning Prize—one of the highest honors bestowed by the Academy of American Poets—as well as the Golden Wreath of the Struga Poetry Evenings. In 2010, the Library of Congress named him the 17th United States Poet Laureate.

Reviews

[Jennifer · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like some of Merwin's poems very much, but it can be too much to sit and read an entire book in one sitting. The power of their spare style becomes opaque and hard to focus on. In this book I especially love "The Lights of Marfa" and a few others.

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

Brilliant.

Favorites include “Once in Spring,” “Wings,” “One of the Laws,” “Good People,” “The Fence.”

[Dylan Marcus · Rating 5 out of 5]

metric for enjoyment/wonder = dog eared pages

evidence = many dog ears.

the end.

[Stephen Ryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Typically strong book of poetry from Merwin; a return to form after the longer poems of The Folding Cliffs (one long epic poem) and The River Sound (which featured 3 long poems).

[Ali · Rating 2 out of 5]

Just picked this up because it seemed like a good poetry read. But was not all that moved by the poems. Although they were beautiful and nice to read.

[Mark · Rating 1 out of 5]

I am going to write this although I am only 3/4s of the way finished.

Despite having found 2 poems that I particularly enjoy, and appreciating Merwin's often simple, yet profound, choice of subjects, I am not enjoying this book.

The poems are all written in lower case with no punctuation, and most lines are enjambed. While this cluster of techniques can often be effective they also depend somewhat for their effectiveness on the reader being able to easily parse out where the pauses and stops are. In these poems, Merwin seems to delight in the perversity of making this ambiguous at best and downright hard at worst. This would be fine if reading these poems were to be an academic exercise, but I am reading them for pleasure. Or, more accurately, I am not finding pleasure in them despite their potential to delight. Generally, I feel, a poet needs to meet the reader halfway and Merwin refused to do so in this book.

Amended to add: The above issue is primarily in the many poems that are not divided into stanzas, although it bleeds into some of those also.

[Brian · Rating 5 out of 5]

This, with "The Shadow of Sirius" are probably the two books of poetry I have been the most caught up in a very long time. Before these, for me, was John Donne.

In my review of "The Shadow of Sirius," I call this "easy" poetry for its accessibility. I urge you to get that from it, and then let it soak into you, or vise versa.

To boot, Mr. Merwin is an exceptionally pleasant and warm fellow in person.

[Nicco Mele · Rating 4 out of 5]

My favorite poem: "The Night Plums"... my favorite line: "when the stones of the barnyard lay buried in sleep..." - it just drops on and off the tongue with a graceful bounce.

[Travis · Rating 4 out of 5]

oh white lemurs who invented the dance
this is the time afterward
can you hear me
who invented the story

part of the story

[Mindy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love Merwin in general, but I prefer his later stuff. Concise and pure.

[Bethany]

love love love