What do you think?
Rate this book
The Vigil
Nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award
The Vigil, which first appeared in 1997, finds contemporary American master-poet C. K. Williams taking a more reflective and empathetic turn in his work. As Jonathan Aaron wrote in The Boston Globe: "A matchless explorer of the burdens of consciousness, Williams has always written brilliantly about human pain, that which we inflict upon others and upon ourselves, and that which we experience in dreading what we're fated for. In The Vigil Williams affirms the uncanny resiliency of love as solace for pain—what he calls 'these invisible links that allure, these transfigurations even of anguish that hold us' ('The Neighbor'). It is a mystery he has probed before, but never with quite such sympathy and candor."
The Vigil, which first appeared in 1997, finds contemporary American master-poet C. K. Williams taking a more reflective and empathetic turn in his work. As Jonathan Aaron wrote in The Boston Globe: "A matchless explorer of the burdens of consciousness, Williams has always written brilliantly about human pain, that which we inflict upon others and upon ourselves, and that which we experience in dreading what we're fated for. In The Vigil Williams affirms the uncanny resiliency of love as solace for pain—what he calls 'these invisible links that allure, these transfigurations even of anguish that hold us' ('The Neighbor'). It is a mystery he has probed before, but never with quite such sympathy and candor."
96 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 1996
54 people want to read
About the author
C.K. Williams
70 books72 followersC.K. Williams was born and grew up in and around Newark, New Jersey. He graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, where he majored in philosophy and English. He has published many books of poetry, including Repair, which was awarded the 2000 Pulitzer Prize, The Singing which won the National Book Award for 2003, and Flesh and Blood, the winner of the National Book Critics Circle Prize in 1987. He has also been awarded the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, the PEN Voelker Career Achievement Award in Poetry for 1998; a Guggeheim Fellowship, two NEA grants, the Berlin Prize of the American Academy in Berlin, a Lila Wallace Fellowship, the Los Angeles Book Prize, and an award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
He published a memoir, Misgivings, in 2000, which was awarded the PEN Albrand Memoir Award, and translations of Sophocles’ Women of Trachis, Euripides’ Bacchae, and poems of Francis Ponge, Adam Zagajewski, as well as versions of the Japanese Haiku poet Issa.
His book of essays, Poetry and Consciousness, appeared in 1998. and his most recent, In Time, in 2012. He published a book about Walt Whitman, On Whitman, in 2010, and in 2012 a book of poems, Writers Writing Dying. A book of prose poems, All At Once, will be published in 2014.
He teaches in the Creative Writing Program at Princeton University, is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and was a chancellor of the American Academy of Poets.
He published a memoir, Misgivings, in 2000, which was awarded the PEN Albrand Memoir Award, and translations of Sophocles’ Women of Trachis, Euripides’ Bacchae, and poems of Francis Ponge, Adam Zagajewski, as well as versions of the Japanese Haiku poet Issa.
His book of essays, Poetry and Consciousness, appeared in 1998. and his most recent, In Time, in 2012. He published a book about Walt Whitman, On Whitman, in 2010, and in 2012 a book of poems, Writers Writing Dying. A book of prose poems, All At Once, will be published in 2014.
He teaches in the Creative Writing Program at Princeton University, is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and was a chancellor of the American Academy of Poets.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
April 17, 2020
A fascinating combination of the concrete and the abstract. I had forgotten how well, how experimentally he employs his long line with a wide variety of rhythms, subjects, and moods. It’s good to hold one thing constant, but Williams takes this further than any poet I can think of who doesn’t follow a common form. Sometimes he seems a bit lazy, letting his lines become too prosaic, but sometimes that’s just right for the particular poem.
May 21, 2021
not a big fan of long-line poetry in the first place, and this book even fucked the format. he has a really keen eye for emotion, and in that sense it’s good poetry, it’s just not my favorite form. i want more wordplay!
favorites: spider psyche (for fun language) and insight (for the insights)
favorites: spider psyche (for fun language) and insight (for the insights)
July 3, 2023
3.5 stars.
September 4, 2015
Actual Rating: 4.5 of 5 thorns
This book is very much a collection of remembrance and preservation, a vigil for existence. The language and metaphors are accessible. The book is split into three sections. Part 1 is about slowing down and drawing out the moment, lingering in the silence between time, being a witness. Part 2 focuses on the moment, in motion, in its poignancy, when life meets death/suffering. Finally, Part 3 expands on the forever, the aftermath of existence. The poems build on themselves, coming to a powerful conclusion.
Not only are the writing and concepts beautiful but the book itself is smooth, with a clean and elegant design.
Definitely a book I would read again and add to my permanent collection.
This book is very much a collection of remembrance and preservation, a vigil for existence. The language and metaphors are accessible. The book is split into three sections. Part 1 is about slowing down and drawing out the moment, lingering in the silence between time, being a witness. Part 2 focuses on the moment, in motion, in its poignancy, when life meets death/suffering. Finally, Part 3 expands on the forever, the aftermath of existence. The poems build on themselves, coming to a powerful conclusion.
Not only are the writing and concepts beautiful but the book itself is smooth, with a clean and elegant design.
Definitely a book I would read again and add to my permanent collection.
June 13, 2008
A stuttering of the earth into being, and incantation-like plea for God and love in the face of suffering. I wish I had written it.
Read
January 7, 2013811.54 W7221v 1997
September 20, 2016
"What has been done to us, what have we done?"
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews