Paracritical Hinge: Essays, Talks, Notes, Interviews

by Nathaniel Mackey

Paracritical Hinge is a collection of varied yet interrelated pieces highlighting Nathaniel Mackey’s multifaceted work as writer and critic. It embraces topics ranging from Walt Whitman’s interest in phrenology to the marginalization of African American experiential writing; from Kamau Brathwaite’s "calibanistic" language practices to García Lorca’s flamenco aesthetic of duende and its continuing repercussions; from H.D.’s desert measure and coastal way of knowing to the altered spatial disposition of Miles Davis’s trumpet sound; from Robert Duncan’s Vietnam War poetry to the emancipatory potential of collaborative practices; from serial poetics to diasporic syncretism; from the lyric poem’s present-day predicaments to gnosticism. Offering illuminating commentary on these and other artists including Amiri Baraka, Mississippi Fred McDowell, Wilson Harris, Jack Spicer, John Coltrane, Jay Wright, and Bob Kaufman, Paracritical Hinge also sheds light on Mackey’s own work as a poet, fiction writer, and editor.

Genres: Poetry

312 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

Poet and novelist Nathaniel Mackey was born in 1947 in Miami, Florida. He received a BA degree from Princeton University and a PhD from Stanford University.

Nathaniel Mackey has received numerous awards including a Whiting Writer’s Award and a 2010 Guggenheim fellowship. He is the Reynolds Price Professor of English at Duke University and served as a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets from 2001 to 2007. Mackey currently lives in Durham, North Carolina.

Reviews

[Joseph Spuckler · Rating 4 out of 5]

Paracritical Hinge: Essay, Talks, Notes, Interviews by Nathaniel Mackey Mackey is an American poet, novelist, anthologist, literary critic, and editor. He is the Reynolds Price Professor of Creative Writing at Duke University and a Chancellor of The Academy of American Poets. Mackey is currently teaching a poetry workshop at Duke University. He has been editor and publisher of Hambone since 1982 and he won the National Book Award for Poetry in 2006. In 2014, he was awarded the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, and in 2015 he won Yale's Bollingen Prize for American Poetry.

Paracritical Hinge refers to the pivotal point of the combination of poetry, fiction, and art. Mackey examines several subjects including an interesting examination of phenology, the poetry of the Vietnam War, and jazz. He also discusses writers and arts in his work like Amiri Baraka and John Coltrane.

This is clearly a work for those familiar with Mackey and his work. The reading is not easy especially for one whose field of study and interest are not strongly connected to Mackey's. The writing in the body of the work is complex with plenty of names and themes that are understood to be known. I had to skip through the introduction because it was over my head. I found it a little odd that I could follow along in sections where I had an understanding of the subject matter but was lost in the introduction that was supposed to introduce the subject and ease me into it. A difficult but rewarding work that clearly is not for everyone.

[Laurel Perez · Rating 3 out of 5]

While interesting at times, this wasn't my favorite. Yet, there seems to be a need for more of this kind of reading. maybe something I'll revisit.