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100 Poems to Break Your Heart
100 of the most moving and inspiring poems of the last 200 years from around the world, a collection that will comfort and enthrall anyone trapped by grief or loneliness, selected by the award-winning, best-selling, and beloved author of How to Read a Poem
Implicit in poetry is the idea that we are enriched by heartbreaks, by the recognition and understanding of suffering—not just our own suffering but also the pain of others. We are not so much diminished as enlarged by grief, by our refusal to vanish, or to let others vanish, without leaving a record. And poets are people who are determined to leave a trace in words, to transform oceanic depths of feeling into art that speaks to others.
In 100 Poems to Break Your Heart, poet and advocate Edward Hirsch selects 100 poems, from the nineteenth century to the present, and illuminates them, unpacking context and references to help the reader fully experience the range of emotion and wisdom within these poems.
For anyone trying to process grief, loneliness, or fear, this collection of poetry will be your guide in trying times.
Implicit in poetry is the idea that we are enriched by heartbreaks, by the recognition and understanding of suffering—not just our own suffering but also the pain of others. We are not so much diminished as enlarged by grief, by our refusal to vanish, or to let others vanish, without leaving a record. And poets are people who are determined to leave a trace in words, to transform oceanic depths of feeling into art that speaks to others.
In 100 Poems to Break Your Heart, poet and advocate Edward Hirsch selects 100 poems, from the nineteenth century to the present, and illuminates them, unpacking context and references to help the reader fully experience the range of emotion and wisdom within these poems.
For anyone trying to process grief, loneliness, or fear, this collection of poetry will be your guide in trying times.
517 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 30, 2021
237 people are currently reading
1412 people want to read
About the author
Edward Hirsch
77 books173 followersEdward Hirsch is a celebrated poet and peerless advocate for poetry. He was born in Chicago in 1950—his accent makes it impossible for him to hide his origins—and educated at Grinnell College and the University of Pennsylvania, where he received a Ph.D. in Folklore. His devotion to poetry is lifelong.He has received numerous awards and fellowships, including a MacArthur Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, an Ingram Merrill Foundation Award, a Pablo Neruda Presidential Medal of Honor, the Prix de Rome, and an Academy of Arts and Letters Award. In 2008, he was elected a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets.
bio-img
Edward Hirsch’s first collection of poems, For the Sleepwalkers (1981), received the Delmore Schwartz Memorial Award from New York University and the Lavan Younger Poets Award from the Academy of American Poets. His second collection, Wild Gratitude (1986), won the National Book Critics Award.
Since then, he has published six additional books of poems: The Night Parade (1989), Earthly Measures (1994),On Love (1998), Lay Back the Darkness (2003), Special Orders (2008), and The Living Fire: New and Selected Poems (2010), which brings together thirty-five years of poems.Hirsch is also the author of five prose books, including A Poet’s Glossary (2014), the result of decades of passionate study, Poet’s Choice (2006), which consists of his popular columns from the Washington Post Book World, and How to Read a Poem and Fall in Love with Poetry (1999), a national bestseller. He is the editor of Theodore Roethke’s Selected Poems (2005) and co-editor of The Making of a Sonnet: A Norton Anthology (2008). He also edits the series “The Writer’s World” (Trinity University Press).Edward Hirsch taught for six years in the English Department at Wayne State University and seventeen years in the Creative Writing Program at the University of Houston. He is now president of the
John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.
bio-img
Edward Hirsch’s first collection of poems, For the Sleepwalkers (1981), received the Delmore Schwartz Memorial Award from New York University and the Lavan Younger Poets Award from the Academy of American Poets. His second collection, Wild Gratitude (1986), won the National Book Critics Award.
Since then, he has published six additional books of poems: The Night Parade (1989), Earthly Measures (1994),On Love (1998), Lay Back the Darkness (2003), Special Orders (2008), and The Living Fire: New and Selected Poems (2010), which brings together thirty-five years of poems.Hirsch is also the author of five prose books, including A Poet’s Glossary (2014), the result of decades of passionate study, Poet’s Choice (2006), which consists of his popular columns from the Washington Post Book World, and How to Read a Poem and Fall in Love with Poetry (1999), a national bestseller. He is the editor of Theodore Roethke’s Selected Poems (2005) and co-editor of The Making of a Sonnet: A Norton Anthology (2008). He also edits the series “The Writer’s World” (Trinity University Press).Edward Hirsch taught for six years in the English Department at Wayne State University and seventeen years in the Creative Writing Program at the University of Houston. He is now president of the
John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 112 reviews
November 9, 2020
⭐️ 3.75 / 5 ⭐️
Just pretend to read this as if you’re John Keating from The Dead Poet’s Society, complete with your dark academia sweater, and you’ll have the time of your life.
When I first requested this, I thought it was just going to be a nice compilation. Then, of course, I found out it was more of a commentary in addition to the poems. Anyway, after clearing up my confusion and reading the synopsis, I was expecting more of an emotional insight to the poetry with historical context - and while we did get some of that - there were more facts than feelings. And that did impact my reading enjoyment level. But in all honesty, I don’t think that’s what this book is about. It’s about information, more than anything.
This was an intense dive into some of the world’s most angsty poets and their poetry. It was honestly so huge for a poetry book, and there were many times where I felt it could have been shorter. The writing was excellent, however, and I liked how informative it was. It’s not a book you read to enjoy unless poetry is your life. It’s a book you read for educational insight. It’s for the poetry die-hards, the ones who are in love with the history, facts, and technicality behind a poem. I did find the commentary on the poetry to drag at certain points, but it was a very informative read.
So, all in all, did I enjoy it? Not really. But did I learn a lot? Yes!
Big thank you to Netgalley + Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for sending me an ARC copy of this book!
Just pretend to read this as if you’re John Keating from The Dead Poet’s Society, complete with your dark academia sweater, and you’ll have the time of your life.
When I first requested this, I thought it was just going to be a nice compilation. Then, of course, I found out it was more of a commentary in addition to the poems. Anyway, after clearing up my confusion and reading the synopsis, I was expecting more of an emotional insight to the poetry with historical context - and while we did get some of that - there were more facts than feelings. And that did impact my reading enjoyment level. But in all honesty, I don’t think that’s what this book is about. It’s about information, more than anything.
This was an intense dive into some of the world’s most angsty poets and their poetry. It was honestly so huge for a poetry book, and there were many times where I felt it could have been shorter. The writing was excellent, however, and I liked how informative it was. It’s not a book you read to enjoy unless poetry is your life. It’s a book you read for educational insight. It’s for the poetry die-hards, the ones who are in love with the history, facts, and technicality behind a poem. I did find the commentary on the poetry to drag at certain points, but it was a very informative read.
So, all in all, did I enjoy it? Not really. But did I learn a lot? Yes!
Big thank you to Netgalley + Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for sending me an ARC copy of this book!
November 7, 2020
I started reading this book last month just before my wonderful mother-in-law died and finished it Friday, the day my wonderful father-in-law died. I certainly didn't need any help having my heart broken in the past month. My parents died when I was young and our family has been rocked with grief at losing both of my husband's parents and both of my children's beloved grandparents within 3 weeks of each other. None of us has any doubt that Chester died of a broken heart after losing his best friend of 65 years.
So it was perhaps a bad time to read a book that promises to break your heart. I did actually enjoy the book, though. I read a few poems a day, which took a long time since the editor spends many pages carefully examining the background of each poet and poem, along with very detailed insights into things like the poetic styles, meter, alliteration and so on. I see that many reviewers minded this but I actually enjoyed it (though I did sometimes skim his words) because he offered insights into the actual building of each poem that I really would have missed in many cases.
I majored in creative writing and had over 100 poems published in my youth, so I am experienced with poetry. That said, the editor is clearly a poetry scholar and he is incredibly knowledgeable about poetic forms and elements. There were many instances where he pointed out carefully crafted elements of a poem that I would have missed. Did I need to know them? Probably not, but it was an interesting peek into the poems themselves, a lot like looking at the code that builds a web page or computer game. I also really appreciated the back stories, knowing heartbreaking details about the poets' lives and what they were going through when some of the poems were written.
The poems themselves are in chronological order and use a nice balance of poems from around the world instead of focusing only on English speaking poets and Western poetry. Many are translated, but they are translated well. Themes include death, war and loneliness. I expected more of some subjects like sexual abuse and assault, racism, mental illness, LGBTQ issues, and so on. There is a good mix of male and female poets, but the themes themselves seem a little more male-centered to me (that could be bias because I am female, though). I expected more along the lines of Anne Sexton and Sylvia Plath about some of the heartbreaking aspects of being a woman (especially in earlier times) and also more from poets of color about issues like slavery and racism. I am also currently reading a compilation of 250 years of African American poetry and that one is so full of really heartbreaking stuff that it almost made this one seem like "heartbreak lite" in comparison. Many of these poems seem universal -- almost anyone could relate to them -- as opposed to focusing on very personal subjects or topics that don't apply to all. This could be seen as good or bad, depending on what you're looking for.
As the book is arranged by the poems' dates of publications, I also found myself reading the dates and anticipating which historical elements would come up. I was very curious what themes would be covered in the poems of the past 20 years, and was a little disappointed at the lack of timely topics. Again, this speaks to the universality of the poems, and some people may prefer that.
This would be an especially useful book for homeschooling high school poetry or for those who want to understand the bones of poetry, since so much focus is on how the poems are constructed and what literary devices are used. As mentioned, some people dislike this, but it's great knowledge for those who are looking for it. The poems themselves are generally good poems that are accessible for everybody and not the obscure, hard to understand types, though some are more academic than others. Again, I think the author/editor's own background heavily dictated the poems he chose. I may give this book to my 20 year old daughter for Christmas this year, since she loves both poetry and heartbreak, but I'm pretty sure she'll skip the explanation pages.
I read a digital ARC of this book for review.
So it was perhaps a bad time to read a book that promises to break your heart. I did actually enjoy the book, though. I read a few poems a day, which took a long time since the editor spends many pages carefully examining the background of each poet and poem, along with very detailed insights into things like the poetic styles, meter, alliteration and so on. I see that many reviewers minded this but I actually enjoyed it (though I did sometimes skim his words) because he offered insights into the actual building of each poem that I really would have missed in many cases.
I majored in creative writing and had over 100 poems published in my youth, so I am experienced with poetry. That said, the editor is clearly a poetry scholar and he is incredibly knowledgeable about poetic forms and elements. There were many instances where he pointed out carefully crafted elements of a poem that I would have missed. Did I need to know them? Probably not, but it was an interesting peek into the poems themselves, a lot like looking at the code that builds a web page or computer game. I also really appreciated the back stories, knowing heartbreaking details about the poets' lives and what they were going through when some of the poems were written.
The poems themselves are in chronological order and use a nice balance of poems from around the world instead of focusing only on English speaking poets and Western poetry. Many are translated, but they are translated well. Themes include death, war and loneliness. I expected more of some subjects like sexual abuse and assault, racism, mental illness, LGBTQ issues, and so on. There is a good mix of male and female poets, but the themes themselves seem a little more male-centered to me (that could be bias because I am female, though). I expected more along the lines of Anne Sexton and Sylvia Plath about some of the heartbreaking aspects of being a woman (especially in earlier times) and also more from poets of color about issues like slavery and racism. I am also currently reading a compilation of 250 years of African American poetry and that one is so full of really heartbreaking stuff that it almost made this one seem like "heartbreak lite" in comparison. Many of these poems seem universal -- almost anyone could relate to them -- as opposed to focusing on very personal subjects or topics that don't apply to all. This could be seen as good or bad, depending on what you're looking for.
As the book is arranged by the poems' dates of publications, I also found myself reading the dates and anticipating which historical elements would come up. I was very curious what themes would be covered in the poems of the past 20 years, and was a little disappointed at the lack of timely topics. Again, this speaks to the universality of the poems, and some people may prefer that.
This would be an especially useful book for homeschooling high school poetry or for those who want to understand the bones of poetry, since so much focus is on how the poems are constructed and what literary devices are used. As mentioned, some people dislike this, but it's great knowledge for those who are looking for it. The poems themselves are generally good poems that are accessible for everybody and not the obscure, hard to understand types, though some are more academic than others. Again, I think the author/editor's own background heavily dictated the poems he chose. I may give this book to my 20 year old daughter for Christmas this year, since she loves both poetry and heartbreak, but I'm pretty sure she'll skip the explanation pages.
I read a digital ARC of this book for review.
September 17, 2021
I find this collection quite dense and serious. Well, I didn't expect it from the blurb.
But nevertheless, I feel this book would be quite helpful to poetry lovers and would get detailed views on various poets mentioned.
The contents discuss in details the works of William Wordsworth, John Keats, John Clare, Tennyson, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Constantine Cavafy, Thomas Hardy, Edward Thomas, Guillaume Apollinaire, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Langton Hughes, Charlotte Mew, César Vallejo and many more poets.
Take your time. I did. And it's really insightful how the author discussed some poetry worth reading.
Thanks NetGalley for the ARC.
But nevertheless, I feel this book would be quite helpful to poetry lovers and would get detailed views on various poets mentioned.
The contents discuss in details the works of William Wordsworth, John Keats, John Clare, Tennyson, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Constantine Cavafy, Thomas Hardy, Edward Thomas, Guillaume Apollinaire, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Langton Hughes, Charlotte Mew, César Vallejo and many more poets.
Take your time. I did. And it's really insightful how the author discussed some poetry worth reading.
Thanks NetGalley for the ARC.
September 26, 2024
So, poetry.
"Dante conceived of it as a species of eloquence. Sir Philip Sidney called it “a speaking picture.” Coleridge characterized it as “the best words in the best order.” Robert Graves thought of it as “stored magic,” André Breton as a “room of marvels.” In our time, Joseph Brodsky described poetry as “accelerated thinking,” and Seamus Heaney called it “language in orbit.” And now we also know that poetry is something unsayable. Some essential part of it cannot be spoken. It is a human truth beyond words."
"Poetry companions us." In the introduction, author/poet/commentator Edward Hirsch acknowledges the role of poetry in our lives of walking beside us and leading us through our tough times. Hirsch goes on to say, "Implicit in poetry is the notion that we are deepened by heartbreaks, by the recognition and understanding of suffering—not just our own suffering but also the suffering of others. We are not so much diminished as enlarged by grief, by our refusal to vanish, or to let others vanish, without leaving a verbal record."
That is this book. Hirsch shares poems that will crack you, snap you, rip you open, and then he, like a gentle and wise father walks us through the poems, and, in the process, we are deepened, and strengthened.
"Dante conceived of it as a species of eloquence. Sir Philip Sidney called it “a speaking picture.” Coleridge characterized it as “the best words in the best order.” Robert Graves thought of it as “stored magic,” André Breton as a “room of marvels.” In our time, Joseph Brodsky described poetry as “accelerated thinking,” and Seamus Heaney called it “language in orbit.” And now we also know that poetry is something unsayable. Some essential part of it cannot be spoken. It is a human truth beyond words."
"Poetry companions us." In the introduction, author/poet/commentator Edward Hirsch acknowledges the role of poetry in our lives of walking beside us and leading us through our tough times. Hirsch goes on to say, "Implicit in poetry is the notion that we are deepened by heartbreaks, by the recognition and understanding of suffering—not just our own suffering but also the suffering of others. We are not so much diminished as enlarged by grief, by our refusal to vanish, or to let others vanish, without leaving a verbal record."
That is this book. Hirsch shares poems that will crack you, snap you, rip you open, and then he, like a gentle and wise father walks us through the poems, and, in the process, we are deepened, and strengthened.
January 21, 2022
To the many reviewers here who got gratis copies of this book only to complain about it and how the author's intellectualism gets in the way of the poems he presents...
- An open heart can’t flourish without an open mind.
- An open heart requires curiosity, inquisitiveness, thirst for truth.
- To starve one is to starve the other.
- You can't love something you don't know.
- The more you know about someone or something, the better you can love-serve them.
- There is really only heartmind.
The false dichotomy of mind and heart - the idea that thinking gets in the way of deeeep feeeelings - is postmodern dualistic poppycock. The heart and the brain may be different organs but they function as a whole human being. No heart can feel without awareness. Knowledge is a kind of awareness that enlarges compassion, appreciation, gratitude. Poets are also knowledge seekers. Be curious, seek knowledge - your heart will reap great rewards...
This is a fabulous book that, while demonstrating the above truths, presents a wide-ranging selection of 100 touching, moving poems in biographical and historical context. That these were chosen to help break your heart means that they were chosen to help you feel compassion for others. This book is really a compassion practice. Hirsch demonstrates his compassion by also demonstrating his knowledge and curiosity about the biographical and historical context of each poet/poem. For those of us who haven't studied literature and poetics, his help with the language and structure of the poem also greatly expands our ability to enjoy them. Knowing something about the culture and times of the poet also allows us to better appreciate/have compassion for the particular suffering expressed by the poet.
Here is why knowledge is important for compassion: if you don't know the particulars, the specific conditions and context of another person's suffering - if you just assume their suffering is like yours - you completely cut off your ability to have compassion for them. All humans suffer, but each human suffers differently. Everyone suffers as an individual, but we also suffer according to our cultural identities: women suffer differently than men; in western countries, BIPOC people suffer differently than whites; in China, non-Han people suffer differently than Han people; LGBTQ suffer differently than straight... listening to, learning, and remembering the specific suffering narratives of others, both the individual and cultural-identity specifics, allows us to have more compassion for others.
Having more knowledge of the specific sufferings of others allows us to be more aware, more sensitive, more compassionate. To say it yet again - you are best able to love those who you know best. And - It’s hard to care for something you know nothing about. If you haven’t noticed, there’s a principal here. Get curious already!
We should thank Edward Hirsch for feeding our heartminds, for providing us a compassion practice, and for treating us all like the whole human beings that we are.
- An open heart can’t flourish without an open mind.
- An open heart requires curiosity, inquisitiveness, thirst for truth.
- To starve one is to starve the other.
- You can't love something you don't know.
- The more you know about someone or something, the better you can love-serve them.
- There is really only heartmind.
The false dichotomy of mind and heart - the idea that thinking gets in the way of deeeep feeeelings - is postmodern dualistic poppycock. The heart and the brain may be different organs but they function as a whole human being. No heart can feel without awareness. Knowledge is a kind of awareness that enlarges compassion, appreciation, gratitude. Poets are also knowledge seekers. Be curious, seek knowledge - your heart will reap great rewards...
This is a fabulous book that, while demonstrating the above truths, presents a wide-ranging selection of 100 touching, moving poems in biographical and historical context. That these were chosen to help break your heart means that they were chosen to help you feel compassion for others. This book is really a compassion practice. Hirsch demonstrates his compassion by also demonstrating his knowledge and curiosity about the biographical and historical context of each poet/poem. For those of us who haven't studied literature and poetics, his help with the language and structure of the poem also greatly expands our ability to enjoy them. Knowing something about the culture and times of the poet also allows us to better appreciate/have compassion for the particular suffering expressed by the poet.
Here is why knowledge is important for compassion: if you don't know the particulars, the specific conditions and context of another person's suffering - if you just assume their suffering is like yours - you completely cut off your ability to have compassion for them. All humans suffer, but each human suffers differently. Everyone suffers as an individual, but we also suffer according to our cultural identities: women suffer differently than men; in western countries, BIPOC people suffer differently than whites; in China, non-Han people suffer differently than Han people; LGBTQ suffer differently than straight... listening to, learning, and remembering the specific suffering narratives of others, both the individual and cultural-identity specifics, allows us to have more compassion for others.
Having more knowledge of the specific sufferings of others allows us to be more aware, more sensitive, more compassionate. To say it yet again - you are best able to love those who you know best. And - It’s hard to care for something you know nothing about. If you haven’t noticed, there’s a principal here. Get curious already!
We should thank Edward Hirsch for feeding our heartminds, for providing us a compassion practice, and for treating us all like the whole human beings that we are.
November 3, 2020
I received an advance reader copy of this book to read in exchange for an honest review via netgalley and the publishers.
100 poems to break your heart was a book I had to drag myself through and which I ended up skipping some pages and focusing more on just the poems rather than the information that accompanied them. I found this book to be too heavy and dense for me to get into and got bored reading it, but thats not to say that others won't enjoy it.
100 poems to break your heart was a book I had to drag myself through and which I ended up skipping some pages and focusing more on just the poems rather than the information that accompanied them. I found this book to be too heavy and dense for me to get into and got bored reading it, but thats not to say that others won't enjoy it.
October 14, 2020
2/5 stars!
I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
This book has an interesting premise that excites me a lot back then. I can see the appeal of this for those who are yet to start reading poetry and want to practice how to analyze or extract meaning from poems/prose. However, for someone who likes to have my own interpretation of a piece, I really didn't like this book. I felt like I'm being forced to have this take on these entries when I have another interpretation of it and that annoys me a lot. I don't think all poetry readers will like this book since it caters to a niche audience.
I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
This book has an interesting premise that excites me a lot back then. I can see the appeal of this for those who are yet to start reading poetry and want to practice how to analyze or extract meaning from poems/prose. However, for someone who likes to have my own interpretation of a piece, I really didn't like this book. I felt like I'm being forced to have this take on these entries when I have another interpretation of it and that annoys me a lot. I don't think all poetry readers will like this book since it caters to a niche audience.
October 16, 2022
Thanks to NetGalley for this advanced paperback edition copy of 100 Poems To Break Your Heart!! This book is magic. Beautiful, wonderful, vehement melancholic magic.
Each meticulously chosen poem is accompanied by interpretations, notes, and the author’s thoughts. A book like this has the potential to be pretentious and stuffy, but luckily it was neither.
Wallowing is such a vital piece of the human experience. Sad poetry is my favorite. Sit me down with a good dirge and I’ll be contentedly in my bed for days. Why? for the same reason I read Joan Didion and rewatch New Moon every few months—I’m a glutton for punishment.
Brava, bravo
Each meticulously chosen poem is accompanied by interpretations, notes, and the author’s thoughts. A book like this has the potential to be pretentious and stuffy, but luckily it was neither.
Wallowing is such a vital piece of the human experience. Sad poetry is my favorite. Sit me down with a good dirge and I’ll be contentedly in my bed for days. Why? for the same reason I read Joan Didion and rewatch New Moon every few months—I’m a glutton for punishment.
Brava, bravo
April 26, 2021
This is a long collection, so be prepared! If you are prepared to take in a few poems at a time, it's a great read!
This collection is serious and packed full of content, as well as commentary. It's a really interesting take and I enjoyed it. Normally I enjoy reading a few poems at a time, but I had to binge this one due to time constraints. It's a massive one that I don't recommend reading in one sitting, but it's still a great read!
Three out of five stars.
Thank you to NetGalley and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for providing me a free copy of this book in exchange of an honest review.
This collection is serious and packed full of content, as well as commentary. It's a really interesting take and I enjoyed it. Normally I enjoy reading a few poems at a time, but I had to binge this one due to time constraints. It's a massive one that I don't recommend reading in one sitting, but it's still a great read!
Three out of five stars.
Thank you to NetGalley and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for providing me a free copy of this book in exchange of an honest review.
May 10, 2023
4/5
The poetry was great!
The commentary was excellent!!
The poetry was great!
The commentary was excellent!!
March 10, 2022
3 stars
Title is very apt. I did cry many many times reading this.
What I loved most (and this was 500 pages so there's a lot to love) is the explanations that accompanied every poem. It gave me very much Dead Poets Society vibes. My only wish is that there was more diversity in the poems. A lot of them featured death or lost love - which makes sense - but there is so much more sadness in the world. I did find them getting a bit repetitive by the end.
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The ARC of this book was provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Title is very apt. I did cry many many times reading this.
What I loved most (and this was 500 pages so there's a lot to love) is the explanations that accompanied every poem. It gave me very much Dead Poets Society vibes. My only wish is that there was more diversity in the poems. A lot of them featured death or lost love - which makes sense - but there is so much more sadness in the world. I did find them getting a bit repetitive by the end.
Find me on: instagram
The ARC of this book was provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
November 9, 2021
My heart is still intact (one hundred times over). Still, a more enjoyable experience than I thought it would be.
December 23, 2021
“In a murderous time
the heart breaks and breaks
and lives by breaking.”
— Stanley Kunitz, ‘The Testing-Tree’
“Implicit in poetry is the notion that we are deepened by heartbreaks, by the recognition and understanding of suffering — not just our own suffering but also the suffering of others. We are not so much diminished as enlarged by grief, by our refusal to vanish, or to let others vanish, without leaving a verbal record. The poet is one who will not be reconciled, who is determined to leave a trace in words, to transform oceanic depths of feeling into the faithful nuances of art.”
This wide-ranging selection combines popular choices of traditional poems with powerful poems by contemporary writers more tuned to our present age of doubt and disbelief.
Hirsch has chosen poems from the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-first centuries. He creates a dramatic, sometimes biographical, often historical context for the poems, explaining their references, teasing out their meanings, unpacking them.
The anthology includes sonnets and sestinas, aubades and elegies, an ecologue, a villanelle, a blues poem, a night song or nocturne, a pantoum, prose poems, lyrics that rhyme and lyrics that don’t, intentional and unintentional fragments, poems pitched at the level of speech, others that sing. There are prayers and anti-prayers.
There is always something untranslatable about a poem, but Hirsch has included a wide range of poems that have been translated into English from many different languages, poems from Greek, French, Spanish, Russian, Hungarian, Polish, Yiddish, Hebrew, Turkish, German, Portuguese, and Arabic.
Poems are written in solitude, but they reach out to others, which makes poetry a social act. It rises out of one solitude to meet another. Poems of terrible sadness and loss trouble and challenge us, but they also make us feel less alone and more connected. Our own desolations become more recognizable to us, more articulate, something shared. We become less isolated in our sorrow, and thus are befriended by the words of another. There is something ennobling in grief that is compacted, expressed, and transfigured into poetry.
Grief isn’t denied but experienced and made more bearable by being put into memorable words. Searing poems of lament are followed by moving elegies celebrating the lives of those we will always love. Whether and how the spirit survives is then explored in an extraordinary gathering of poems.
No one escapes unscathed — we all have our hearts broken. and yet, as Czelaw Milosz puts it in his ‘Elegy for N.N’, “the heart does not die when one thinks it should”. Despite everything, we go on.
These poems don’t offer easy answers to grief, they keep the kind of company that only poetry can, because only poetry can convincingly say, as Ruth Stone does in her poem ‘Train Ride’, “All things come to an end. / No, they go on forever”.
Among some of my favourite poets included in the anthology are Naomi Shihab Nye; Louise Gluck; Sharon Olds; Joy Harjo; Adrienne Rich; Les Murray; Marie Howe; Stanley Kunitz; Brigit Pegeen Kelly; Lucille Clifton; Eavan Boland; Galway Kinnell; Mary Oliver; Natasha Trethewey; Tony Hoagland; Michael Waters; Lucie Brock-Broido; Yusuf Komunyakaa, and Victoria Chang.
A huge thank you to @NetGalley and @Houghton_Mifflin for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
the heart breaks and breaks
and lives by breaking.”
— Stanley Kunitz, ‘The Testing-Tree’
“Implicit in poetry is the notion that we are deepened by heartbreaks, by the recognition and understanding of suffering — not just our own suffering but also the suffering of others. We are not so much diminished as enlarged by grief, by our refusal to vanish, or to let others vanish, without leaving a verbal record. The poet is one who will not be reconciled, who is determined to leave a trace in words, to transform oceanic depths of feeling into the faithful nuances of art.”
This wide-ranging selection combines popular choices of traditional poems with powerful poems by contemporary writers more tuned to our present age of doubt and disbelief.
Hirsch has chosen poems from the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-first centuries. He creates a dramatic, sometimes biographical, often historical context for the poems, explaining their references, teasing out their meanings, unpacking them.
The anthology includes sonnets and sestinas, aubades and elegies, an ecologue, a villanelle, a blues poem, a night song or nocturne, a pantoum, prose poems, lyrics that rhyme and lyrics that don’t, intentional and unintentional fragments, poems pitched at the level of speech, others that sing. There are prayers and anti-prayers.
There is always something untranslatable about a poem, but Hirsch has included a wide range of poems that have been translated into English from many different languages, poems from Greek, French, Spanish, Russian, Hungarian, Polish, Yiddish, Hebrew, Turkish, German, Portuguese, and Arabic.
Poems are written in solitude, but they reach out to others, which makes poetry a social act. It rises out of one solitude to meet another. Poems of terrible sadness and loss trouble and challenge us, but they also make us feel less alone and more connected. Our own desolations become more recognizable to us, more articulate, something shared. We become less isolated in our sorrow, and thus are befriended by the words of another. There is something ennobling in grief that is compacted, expressed, and transfigured into poetry.
Grief isn’t denied but experienced and made more bearable by being put into memorable words. Searing poems of lament are followed by moving elegies celebrating the lives of those we will always love. Whether and how the spirit survives is then explored in an extraordinary gathering of poems.
No one escapes unscathed — we all have our hearts broken. and yet, as Czelaw Milosz puts it in his ‘Elegy for N.N’, “the heart does not die when one thinks it should”. Despite everything, we go on.
These poems don’t offer easy answers to grief, they keep the kind of company that only poetry can, because only poetry can convincingly say, as Ruth Stone does in her poem ‘Train Ride’, “All things come to an end. / No, they go on forever”.
Among some of my favourite poets included in the anthology are Naomi Shihab Nye; Louise Gluck; Sharon Olds; Joy Harjo; Adrienne Rich; Les Murray; Marie Howe; Stanley Kunitz; Brigit Pegeen Kelly; Lucille Clifton; Eavan Boland; Galway Kinnell; Mary Oliver; Natasha Trethewey; Tony Hoagland; Michael Waters; Lucie Brock-Broido; Yusuf Komunyakaa, and Victoria Chang.
A huge thank you to @NetGalley and @Houghton_Mifflin for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
November 4, 2020
I don't understand why was there a need for this book. It actually forces me to analyse these 100 finest collection of poems according to the author's perspective.
I really like reading poetry and I am an avid poetry reader as well. I read and like portey only for the fact that it helps the reader individually analyse and make meaning out of it. It does not generalize it, that's the beauty of poetry. Also, sometimes it's ok to not remove meaning out of each and every poetry you read. It's totally okay to just read and feel without actually knowing it's meaning. This book was definitely not what the blurb says and I expected it to be different.
I really like reading poetry and I am an avid poetry reader as well. I read and like portey only for the fact that it helps the reader individually analyse and make meaning out of it. It does not generalize it, that's the beauty of poetry. Also, sometimes it's ok to not remove meaning out of each and every poetry you read. It's totally okay to just read and feel without actually knowing it's meaning. This book was definitely not what the blurb says and I expected it to be different.
April 15, 2022
This was truly a beautiful and heartbreaking collection. There’s a lot of variety and I believe that there is something for everyone here. Lots of poetic forms and a lot of different approaches to heartbreak in itself. This can serve both as a collection for poetry enjoyers and also a good introduction to poetry. I didn’t find any of the commentaries too jargon-y and inaccessible for poetry beginners, and I generally enjoyed the commentary. Highly recommend reading each poem out loud to enjoy the musicality of the poetry fully, as I would recommend for all poems!
September 25, 2021
The best thing I’ve done for myself this year. A poem a day for 100 days…give or take.
September 17, 2024
Under One Small Star
- Wislawa Szymborska
My apologies to chance for calling it necessity.
My apologies to necessity if I'm mistaken, after all.
Please, don't be angry, happiness, that I take you as my due.
May my dead be patient with the way my memories fade.
My apologies to time for all the world I overlook each second.
My apologies to past loves for thinking that the latest is the first.
Forgive me, distant wars, for bringing flowers home.
Forgive me, open wounds, for pricking my finger.
I apologize for my record of minuets to those who cry from the depths.
I apologize to those who wait in railway stations for being asleep today at five a.m.
Pardon me, hounded hope, for laughing from time to time.
Pardon me, deserts, that I don't rush to you bearing a spoonful of water.
And you, falcon, unchanging year after year, always in the same cage,
your gaze always fixed on the same point in space,
forgive me, even if it turns out you were stuffed.
My apologies to the felled tree for the table's four legs.
My apologies to great questions for small answers.
Truth, please don't pay me much attention.
Dignity, please be magnanimous.
Bear with me, O mystery of existence, as I pluck the occasional thread from your train.
Soul, don't take offense that I've only got you now and then.
My apologies to everything that I can't be everywhere at once.
My apologies to everyone that I can't be each woman and each man.
I know I won't be justified as long as I live,
since I myself stand in my own way.
Don't bear me ill will, speech, that I borrow weighty words,
then labor heavily so that they may seem light.
The Small Square
- Sophia de Mello Breyner Andresen
My life had taken the shape of the small square
That autumn when your death was meticulously getting ready
I clung to the square because you loved
The humble and nostalgic humanity of its small shops
Where clerks fold and unfold ribbons and cloth
I tried to become you for you were going to die
And all life there would cease to be mine
I tried to smile the way you smiled
At the newsagent at the tobacconist
And at the woman without legs selling violets
I asked the woman without legs to pray for you
I lit candles before all the altars
Of the churches located on one side of this square
For as soon as I opened my eyes I saw I read
The vocation of eternity written on your face
I summoned the streets the places the people
That had been witnesses of your face
In hopes they would call you in hopes they would unravel
The fabric that death was weaving in you
Woman, Mined
- Carolyn Creedon
In the cosmetics department of Lord & Taylor
they'll take you right there, right out in the open,
plain as day, and snap you with an ultraviolet camera,
show you what you've done to your skin just
by living, your face exposed suddenly like what's
really going on under a lifted-up log, the real you
you are, caught and pinned like a moth,
like a shoplifter, like a woman on a table
and the lady in the crisp white smock will expertly
flick the snapshot in front of you, laid out
like a color-coded map of conquered countries,
the purples and browns places you gave up
without a care in your twenties, to late nights
and poolside deck chairs and men, all the men
you touched, the ones who marked you, whose traces
you bear, and now you can see the archaeology
of tears, their white-acid trails, and the lady
will say, sternly, Look what you did
and you will see the mess of it you made, and you
will see the times when you carelessly went to bed
with someone without the proper moisturizer, when you
suckled that man like a baby, and when you moved
with another like a girl on a rocker until you fell off
and lost him, and finally picked another, like the best-of-all
flower, and kept him, cried on him, made him sandwiches,
made him a baby, and you'll wear your face
with its amber earned, its amethyst, its intaglio tear-
etched diamond, and say, I am cut that way.
- Wislawa Szymborska
My apologies to chance for calling it necessity.
My apologies to necessity if I'm mistaken, after all.
Please, don't be angry, happiness, that I take you as my due.
May my dead be patient with the way my memories fade.
My apologies to time for all the world I overlook each second.
My apologies to past loves for thinking that the latest is the first.
Forgive me, distant wars, for bringing flowers home.
Forgive me, open wounds, for pricking my finger.
I apologize for my record of minuets to those who cry from the depths.
I apologize to those who wait in railway stations for being asleep today at five a.m.
Pardon me, hounded hope, for laughing from time to time.
Pardon me, deserts, that I don't rush to you bearing a spoonful of water.
And you, falcon, unchanging year after year, always in the same cage,
your gaze always fixed on the same point in space,
forgive me, even if it turns out you were stuffed.
My apologies to the felled tree for the table's four legs.
My apologies to great questions for small answers.
Truth, please don't pay me much attention.
Dignity, please be magnanimous.
Bear with me, O mystery of existence, as I pluck the occasional thread from your train.
Soul, don't take offense that I've only got you now and then.
My apologies to everything that I can't be everywhere at once.
My apologies to everyone that I can't be each woman and each man.
I know I won't be justified as long as I live,
since I myself stand in my own way.
Don't bear me ill will, speech, that I borrow weighty words,
then labor heavily so that they may seem light.
The Small Square
- Sophia de Mello Breyner Andresen
My life had taken the shape of the small square
That autumn when your death was meticulously getting ready
I clung to the square because you loved
The humble and nostalgic humanity of its small shops
Where clerks fold and unfold ribbons and cloth
I tried to become you for you were going to die
And all life there would cease to be mine
I tried to smile the way you smiled
At the newsagent at the tobacconist
And at the woman without legs selling violets
I asked the woman without legs to pray for you
I lit candles before all the altars
Of the churches located on one side of this square
For as soon as I opened my eyes I saw I read
The vocation of eternity written on your face
I summoned the streets the places the people
That had been witnesses of your face
In hopes they would call you in hopes they would unravel
The fabric that death was weaving in you
Woman, Mined
- Carolyn Creedon
In the cosmetics department of Lord & Taylor
they'll take you right there, right out in the open,
plain as day, and snap you with an ultraviolet camera,
show you what you've done to your skin just
by living, your face exposed suddenly like what's
really going on under a lifted-up log, the real you
you are, caught and pinned like a moth,
like a shoplifter, like a woman on a table
and the lady in the crisp white smock will expertly
flick the snapshot in front of you, laid out
like a color-coded map of conquered countries,
the purples and browns places you gave up
without a care in your twenties, to late nights
and poolside deck chairs and men, all the men
you touched, the ones who marked you, whose traces
you bear, and now you can see the archaeology
of tears, their white-acid trails, and the lady
will say, sternly, Look what you did
and you will see the mess of it you made, and you
will see the times when you carelessly went to bed
with someone without the proper moisturizer, when you
suckled that man like a baby, and when you moved
with another like a girl on a rocker until you fell off
and lost him, and finally picked another, like the best-of-all
flower, and kept him, cried on him, made him sandwiches,
made him a baby, and you'll wear your face
with its amber earned, its amethyst, its intaglio tear-
etched diamond, and say, I am cut that way.
January 9, 2023
This anthology (and the accompanying analytical essays by Hirsch) covers over two-hundred years of poetry and works with a large set of translated languages as well as poems of English language origin. Therefore, the poems include an eclectic set of forms and schools of poetry. There are narrative poems and philosophical poems. There are sparse poems and elaborate poems. Besides the fact that they are all short to intermediate length poems (a few pages, at most,) the only thing the included poems have in common is some serious subject matter at each poem’s core. There are elegies and cathartic poems of illness or ended relationships, as well as tales of various types of tragedy (personal, global, and of scales in between.)
That said, not all of the poems feature a dark and melancholic tone. There are several poems that are humorous -- in a gallows humor sort of way. Such poems include: Dunya Mikhail’s “The War Works Hard,” Harryette Mullen’s “We Are Not Responsible,” and Stanley Kunitz’s “Halley’s Comet.”
Of course, there are many poems that are as devastatingly sad as the title leads one to expect. Of these, Eavan Boland’s “Quarantine,” the story of a man carrying his illness-ravaged wife in search of survival during a famine in Ireland in 1847 takes the award for saddest. There are poems in this book that are more brutal, encompass vaster scales of suffering, or combine lyrical skill and emotional experience more artfully. But none of those poems socked me in the chest like Boland’s. One thing that struck me during my reading was what an intense force multiplier story is in creating poignant poems. Several others among my favorites told stories that made for visceral reads. These include: “Song” by Brigit Pageen Kelly, “The Race” by Sharon Olds, “Terminus” by Nicholas Christopher (also among the most savage tear-jerkers,) and “The Gas-Poker” by Thom Gunn.
Other favorites include: Langston Hughes’s “Song for a Dark Girl,” Miklós Radnóti’s “The Fifth Eclogue,” Stevie Smith’s “Not Waving but Drowning,” and “Mendocino Rose” by Garrett Hongo.
I’d highly recommend this book for poetry readers.
That said, not all of the poems feature a dark and melancholic tone. There are several poems that are humorous -- in a gallows humor sort of way. Such poems include: Dunya Mikhail’s “The War Works Hard,” Harryette Mullen’s “We Are Not Responsible,” and Stanley Kunitz’s “Halley’s Comet.”
Of course, there are many poems that are as devastatingly sad as the title leads one to expect. Of these, Eavan Boland’s “Quarantine,” the story of a man carrying his illness-ravaged wife in search of survival during a famine in Ireland in 1847 takes the award for saddest. There are poems in this book that are more brutal, encompass vaster scales of suffering, or combine lyrical skill and emotional experience more artfully. But none of those poems socked me in the chest like Boland’s. One thing that struck me during my reading was what an intense force multiplier story is in creating poignant poems. Several others among my favorites told stories that made for visceral reads. These include: “Song” by Brigit Pageen Kelly, “The Race” by Sharon Olds, “Terminus” by Nicholas Christopher (also among the most savage tear-jerkers,) and “The Gas-Poker” by Thom Gunn.
Other favorites include: Langston Hughes’s “Song for a Dark Girl,” Miklós Radnóti’s “The Fifth Eclogue,” Stevie Smith’s “Not Waving but Drowning,” and “Mendocino Rose” by Garrett Hongo.
I’d highly recommend this book for poetry readers.
October 19, 2021
Thank you for the ARC copy @netgalley and @houghtonmifflinharcourt
I was a little disappointed because I thought this was going to be a book of poems, but it was a book analyzing poems. So if you’re looking for a book of poetry to read - I do not recommend this book, however if you enjoy reading another persons analysis about poetry you will love it.
Some of the many poets whose works are included in this collection are Wordsworth, Keats, Tennyson, Hardy, St. Vincent Millay, Langston Hughes, Anne Sexton, Randall Jarrell, Muriel Rukeyser, Robert Lowell, Sharon Olds and Phillip Larkin, among many others. This is certainly a good collection with, as the title suggests, a focus on heartbreak.
This collection will most appeal to serious readers of poetry. There are many kinds of poems including sonnets, aubades, a villanelle, a nocturne and more.
Edward Hirsch has picked some gems. These poems resonate when read but are even better when Hirsch examines them in detail. Again, if that isn’t something you are into - do not buy this book - but if you want something that makes you think deeper about poetry, grab it!
I was a little disappointed because I thought this was going to be a book of poems, but it was a book analyzing poems. So if you’re looking for a book of poetry to read - I do not recommend this book, however if you enjoy reading another persons analysis about poetry you will love it.
Some of the many poets whose works are included in this collection are Wordsworth, Keats, Tennyson, Hardy, St. Vincent Millay, Langston Hughes, Anne Sexton, Randall Jarrell, Muriel Rukeyser, Robert Lowell, Sharon Olds and Phillip Larkin, among many others. This is certainly a good collection with, as the title suggests, a focus on heartbreak.
This collection will most appeal to serious readers of poetry. There are many kinds of poems including sonnets, aubades, a villanelle, a nocturne and more.
Edward Hirsch has picked some gems. These poems resonate when read but are even better when Hirsch examines them in detail. Again, if that isn’t something you are into - do not buy this book - but if you want something that makes you think deeper about poetry, grab it!
December 27, 2020
Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for granting me an eARC. All opinions are my own unbiased views.
---
100 Poems to Break Your Heart is a collection of different poems by a large variety of different poets.
I want to begin this review by explaining that this collection isn't what I thought it would be. When I first requested this on Netgalley, I thought it was a collection of Hirsch's own works. Instead, Hirsch explains his perspective on each of the 100 poems, detailing his own interpretations. Personally, I like to make up my own interpretation rather than having someone else tell me what to think.
If you like modern poetry and critical reading, then this book is for you.
---
100 Poems to Break Your Heart is a collection of different poems by a large variety of different poets.
I want to begin this review by explaining that this collection isn't what I thought it would be. When I first requested this on Netgalley, I thought it was a collection of Hirsch's own works. Instead, Hirsch explains his perspective on each of the 100 poems, detailing his own interpretations. Personally, I like to make up my own interpretation rather than having someone else tell me what to think.
If you like modern poetry and critical reading, then this book is for you.
December 26, 2024
The single most valuable book I read this year. I got through this collection by reading 1-3 poems a day for a few months, and it was always a great way to start my mornings. Hirsch breaks down each poem with a technical, line-level analysis, yet he never sounds stuffy or detached. He manages to maintain a deep connection to the emotional thesis of each poem, and his analysis doesn't disrupt the ineffable magic of poetry; it elevates it. I've loved reading poetry collections for years, but now I find myself more capable than ever of picking up on what a poet is really doing. It's made me a much smarter reader (and writer!) and I'm so thrilled that I gave this book a try.
October 28, 2020
I received an advanced reader copy of this book to read in exchange for an honest review via netgalley.
This is a very interesting book for all poetry lovers. As it says in the title, there are 100 poems included in this book and all of them are accompanied with a thorough analysis. I enjoyed reading it, but I would honestly appreciate something a bit lighter. Rating: 4/5 stars.
This is a very interesting book for all poetry lovers. As it says in the title, there are 100 poems included in this book and all of them are accompanied with a thorough analysis. I enjoyed reading it, but I would honestly appreciate something a bit lighter. Rating: 4/5 stars.
July 25, 2021
"We discover in poetry that we are participating in something which cannot be explained or apprehended by reason or understanding alone. We participate in the imaginary. We create a space for fantasy, we enter our dream life, dream time. We deepen our breathing, our mindfulness to being, our spiritual alertness."
9/7 I'm not crying...
9/7 I'm not crying...
February 4, 2022
"Implicit in poetry is the notion that we are deepened by heartbreaks, by the recognition and understanding of suffering--not just our own suffering but also the suffering of others. We are not so much diminished as enlarged by our grief, by our refusal to vanish, or to let others vanish, without leaving a verbal record."
April 28, 2022
Finishing this book, I feel like a deserve some sort of award. Weighing in at over 500 pages I have to confess I thought I'd never finish it. The poems for the most part pulled me on. The analysis of said poems often left me flat, though I do appreciate Edward Hirsch's depth of understanding of poetry in all its forms. Unfortunately for me I was living with a broken heart as I read these poems to break my heart. Perhaps I need to explore Hirsch's other books to see if he has something similar on a more uplifting topic.
My review: https://headfullofbooks.blogspot.com/...
My review: https://headfullofbooks.blogspot.com/...
November 10, 2020
I was hoping the explanations to be precise and brief. It was an okay-ish read.
On a positive note, the book definitely covered some great poetry. Appreciate the attempt.
On a positive note, the book definitely covered some great poetry. Appreciate the attempt.
August 13, 2024
Excellent. I have always wanted to take a college course on poetry but was told my grades weren’t up to snuff; So I couldn’t do it. However, I really appreciate what this author has done. He wrote this as a college course and it is incredibly well written. Edward Hirsch is a name I want to remember. I am already familiar with such writers as Langston Hughes and Joy Harjo.
Oprah Winfrey has said, “Loving, enthusiastic…Hirsch’s warm and openheartedness help to unlock the treasures of poetry for a world of readers.”
I first learned of Langston Hughes during an on line Poetry class during the pandemic. I liked what I heard and remembered the name. When it came time to rejoin the living, I went straight to the bookstore. “The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes” is incredible!! Took a year and a half from start to finish. Well worth the effort. “Ballad of Seven songs” is a true masterpiece. I really enjoyed his children’s collection as well.
Joy Harjo is a beautiful and strong woman whose overcome many life obsticals. Please check out her poetry memoir “Poet Warrior”. “A beautifully constructed tale of grief, nourishment and bravery.”~Susie Dumond~Book Riot.
The poem “On the road at night there stands a man” by Dahlia Ravikovitch is hauntingly beautiful. Cynthia Huntington left me gobsmacked.
Poets Anne Sexton, Louise Gluck and C.K. Williams deserve shoutouts as well.
Oprah Winfrey has said, “Loving, enthusiastic…Hirsch’s warm and openheartedness help to unlock the treasures of poetry for a world of readers.”
I first learned of Langston Hughes during an on line Poetry class during the pandemic. I liked what I heard and remembered the name. When it came time to rejoin the living, I went straight to the bookstore. “The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes” is incredible!! Took a year and a half from start to finish. Well worth the effort. “Ballad of Seven songs” is a true masterpiece. I really enjoyed his children’s collection as well.
Joy Harjo is a beautiful and strong woman whose overcome many life obsticals. Please check out her poetry memoir “Poet Warrior”. “A beautifully constructed tale of grief, nourishment and bravery.”~Susie Dumond~Book Riot.
The poem “On the road at night there stands a man” by Dahlia Ravikovitch is hauntingly beautiful. Cynthia Huntington left me gobsmacked.
Poets Anne Sexton, Louise Gluck and C.K. Williams deserve shoutouts as well.
January 6, 2022
I am really disappointed in this book of poetry. The layout was poor and made it difficult to find the poems. They were buried in a wall of text instead of being the highlight and easy to find. Maybe this will be corrected in the final proof?
I'm a newbie to reading poetry. While I appreciated the level of detail in the dissection and analysis, it felt like a college textbook. I feel most readers are like me in that they are either new to poetry or casual readers. This level of detail was unnecessary.
I'd suggest this to readers who are advanced poetry readers that want to really understand the context and analysis of the poems. As a new casual reader, this just wasn't for me.
I'm a newbie to reading poetry. While I appreciated the level of detail in the dissection and analysis, it felt like a college textbook. I feel most readers are like me in that they are either new to poetry or casual readers. This level of detail was unnecessary.
I'd suggest this to readers who are advanced poetry readers that want to really understand the context and analysis of the poems. As a new casual reader, this just wasn't for me.
Read
October 3, 2023To be honest, I didn't find this book depressing enough and that's what I was looking for. I was looking for poems that were so sad and depressing but a surprising amount were not. They were just ordinary poems with little emotionality to them. I haven't read poetry in a while so this was a nice change of pace from my usual reading of non-fiction books. With some poems, I found I enjoyed reading Hirsch's commentary more than the actual poem as he had an interesting take on some of them and seemed to bring more insight into the poem that what the actual poem was trying to express.
The poems were from a diverse group of writers. My complaint with the selection of poems was that I wanted to read more older poems. I just don't feel modern poetry really has much potential to be sad, mainly because we live in such an abundant time and the problems we have as a collective just aren't as serious as they were 200 years ago. My comment is directed more towards western countries with a high standard of living (food, sanitation, access to medicine, etc). The poems ranged from year 1815-2018. Only 5 of the poems were older than 1900 and 27 poems were from 2000-2018.
I was also surprised that the author had incorrect information on page 397 about a poet's death. Hirsch makes a large error when writing about Anya Krugovoy Silva. Hirsch writes that she died at 40, however she actually died at 49. Surprised this misinformation slipped through the cracks.
Overall this was a long (477 pages) and interesting book that I recommend reading.
Below are some lines that I thought were interesting, which includes my commentary on various poems:
Pg 9. John Clare "I am"
Lines 3-4
I am the self-consumer of my woes -
They rise and vanish in oblivion's host
Lines 13-14
I long for scenes where man hath never trod,
A place where woman never smiled or wept,
Pg 10. Author provides commentary where he says that the poet rhymes knows, woes, and throes.
Pg 17. Gerald Manley Hopkins "Thou art indeed just, Lord, if I contend"
Lines 3-4
Why do sinners' ways prosper? and why must
Disappointment all I endeavor end?
My comment was that it's common for people to wonder why it seems bad people win out so I found it relatable to read someone feeling this way.
Pg 42. Edna St. Vincent Millay "What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why"
Lines 6-8
And in my heart there stirs a quiet pain
For unremembered lads that not again
Will turn to me at midnight with a cry
Lines 12-14
I cannot say what loves have come and gone,
I only know that summer sang in me
A little while, that in me sings no more.
On page 42, the author says she was 28 when she wrote her sonnet and appropriates Shakespeare's image of aging to express a sense of world-weariness, the loneliness and sorrow of feeling spent at a young age. Hirsch writes that she reminds us that she can't remember any specific loves. There is an awareness that a season of her life has passed. There is a sense of treasured things lost - emotional intimacy, physical contact, companionship, youthful innocence.
Pg 68. Anna Akhmatova "In Memory of M.B."
The author states that MB is Mikhail Bulgakov, who was blacklisted by Stalin.
Lines 3-6
You lived aloof, maintaining to the end
your magnificent disdain.
You drank wine, and told the wittiest jokes,
and suffocated inside stifling walls.
Pg 81. Kadya Molodowsky "Merciful God"
I did not like this poem. She was born in Russia and moved to NYC a few years before the holocaust. Poem is about wanting God to choose another people.
Lines 1-4
Merciful God,
Choose another people,
Elect another.
We are tired of death and dying,
I found this to be inappropriate. Like why does anyone have to die? I get that she probably feels bad and is tired of her religion being persecuted but to say "Choose another people, Elect another." is really just wrong. Is she saying we need to persecute other religious groups such as Muslims or Catholics? That doesn't sound right to me. Nobody should be targeted based on their religion. Lines 2 & 3 should have been removed by the poet.
Last 3 lines
And do us one more favor:
Merciful God,
Deprive us of the Divine Presence of genius
What does that mean? Is she calling Jewish people genius? Hirsch doesn't go into so it's a little unclear and confusing.
Pg 336-337. Brigit Pegeen Kelly "Song"
This poem was written in 1995. I found this poem to be disturbing as it described boys killing a goat as a prank as it was a girl's pet goat. Goat was hung on a tree.
Pg 364. Eavan Boland "Quarantine"
This was actually written pre-pandemic as was written in 2001. It was about the Irish Famine.
Lines 9-12
In the morning they were both found dead.
Of cold. Of hunger. Of the toxins of a whole history.
But her feet were held against his breastbone.
The last heat of his flesh was his last gift to her.
Pg 365. Hirsch writes that this is just one story of the catastrophic Famine that killed more than a million Irish between 1845-1852. This poem sheds light on 2 ordinary people trapped in a dismal situation. It makes me wonder if my husband would do the same for me if I were married. To me that act really embodies love.
The poems were from a diverse group of writers. My complaint with the selection of poems was that I wanted to read more older poems. I just don't feel modern poetry really has much potential to be sad, mainly because we live in such an abundant time and the problems we have as a collective just aren't as serious as they were 200 years ago. My comment is directed more towards western countries with a high standard of living (food, sanitation, access to medicine, etc). The poems ranged from year 1815-2018. Only 5 of the poems were older than 1900 and 27 poems were from 2000-2018.
I was also surprised that the author had incorrect information on page 397 about a poet's death. Hirsch makes a large error when writing about Anya Krugovoy Silva. Hirsch writes that she died at 40, however she actually died at 49. Surprised this misinformation slipped through the cracks.
Overall this was a long (477 pages) and interesting book that I recommend reading.
Below are some lines that I thought were interesting, which includes my commentary on various poems:
Pg 9. John Clare "I am"
Lines 3-4
I am the self-consumer of my woes -
They rise and vanish in oblivion's host
Lines 13-14
I long for scenes where man hath never trod,
A place where woman never smiled or wept,
Pg 10. Author provides commentary where he says that the poet rhymes knows, woes, and throes.
Pg 17. Gerald Manley Hopkins "Thou art indeed just, Lord, if I contend"
Lines 3-4
Why do sinners' ways prosper? and why must
Disappointment all I endeavor end?
My comment was that it's common for people to wonder why it seems bad people win out so I found it relatable to read someone feeling this way.
Pg 42. Edna St. Vincent Millay "What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why"
Lines 6-8
And in my heart there stirs a quiet pain
For unremembered lads that not again
Will turn to me at midnight with a cry
Lines 12-14
I cannot say what loves have come and gone,
I only know that summer sang in me
A little while, that in me sings no more.
On page 42, the author says she was 28 when she wrote her sonnet and appropriates Shakespeare's image of aging to express a sense of world-weariness, the loneliness and sorrow of feeling spent at a young age. Hirsch writes that she reminds us that she can't remember any specific loves. There is an awareness that a season of her life has passed. There is a sense of treasured things lost - emotional intimacy, physical contact, companionship, youthful innocence.
Pg 68. Anna Akhmatova "In Memory of M.B."
The author states that MB is Mikhail Bulgakov, who was blacklisted by Stalin.
Lines 3-6
You lived aloof, maintaining to the end
your magnificent disdain.
You drank wine, and told the wittiest jokes,
and suffocated inside stifling walls.
Pg 81. Kadya Molodowsky "Merciful God"
I did not like this poem. She was born in Russia and moved to NYC a few years before the holocaust. Poem is about wanting God to choose another people.
Lines 1-4
Merciful God,
Choose another people,
Elect another.
We are tired of death and dying,
I found this to be inappropriate. Like why does anyone have to die? I get that she probably feels bad and is tired of her religion being persecuted but to say "Choose another people, Elect another." is really just wrong. Is she saying we need to persecute other religious groups such as Muslims or Catholics? That doesn't sound right to me. Nobody should be targeted based on their religion. Lines 2 & 3 should have been removed by the poet.
Last 3 lines
And do us one more favor:
Merciful God,
Deprive us of the Divine Presence of genius
What does that mean? Is she calling Jewish people genius? Hirsch doesn't go into so it's a little unclear and confusing.
Pg 336-337. Brigit Pegeen Kelly "Song"
This poem was written in 1995. I found this poem to be disturbing as it described boys killing a goat as a prank as it was a girl's pet goat. Goat was hung on a tree.
Pg 364. Eavan Boland "Quarantine"
This was actually written pre-pandemic as was written in 2001. It was about the Irish Famine.
Lines 9-12
In the morning they were both found dead.
Of cold. Of hunger. Of the toxins of a whole history.
But her feet were held against his breastbone.
The last heat of his flesh was his last gift to her.
Pg 365. Hirsch writes that this is just one story of the catastrophic Famine that killed more than a million Irish between 1845-1852. This poem sheds light on 2 ordinary people trapped in a dismal situation. It makes me wonder if my husband would do the same for me if I were married. To me that act really embodies love.
December 28, 2022
My thanks to both NetGalley and the publisher Ecco for an advanced copy of this book on poetry and commentary on sadness, emptiness and words that both reflect this, and lift us out.
Poetry is something that I get a surprising amount out questions about working in bookstores. Besides the summer reading lists books or the newest best sellers from Youtube stars, I am asked alot to recommend poems for people going through difficult times. Customers seem to want poems to help them with the emotions they are feeling, but really don't know what they want, or even what to look for. Some are dealing with loss, some feel lost, and some have lost that loving feeling, to paraphrase a song. Poems though are very personal. What speaks to me, another might think of as corny, or immature, or anything but consoling or equal to what they are feeling. We all universally have the same feelings, but how we express, share and deal with our emotions are universally different. Edward Hirsch, poet, commentator and editor of 100 Poems To Break Your Heart, understands this. In this collection Hirsch offers a variety of poems stretching across the years dealing with love, loss, light and looking forward, breaking the heart to make it mend.
The introduction to the book shares thoughts on the power of words to makes us both feel, and feel better. Poems might break barriers in our mind, letting in thoughts we don't want, but from them, we learn more about ourselves and our resilience. The poems range for the end of the nineteenth century, to a few years ago. The usual players are here, William Wordsworth, Keats, Primo Levi. Some of the newer poets include Carolyn Creedon, Lucia Perillo, and Afaa Michael Weaver. The theme is breaking one's heart, but the subject matter covers quite a few different ideas. Death of course is a major subject. The death of love, and relationships not quite dying, not quite living, is another subject that has quite a bit written about. Some are just misery, be it about the human existence or the sadness that is just the world. Some really don't hold up, but that is common in all collections, as in nothing can be 100% for anyone, especially in the arts. Again what I find comforting, others might find cold and or uninteresting.
Each poems is it' own chapter with the poem broken down to explain what might be missed by a casual reader, and why the poem delivers what it does. There is some biographical looks at the poet's life, the work's reception, other comments about it, and what Hirsch thinks. I liked this a lot as always wonder if I am missing something in a poem, and might help me to explain to customers why this book might be just what they are looking for. The commentary does make the book bigger than people might like, and there could be some people who just want sad poems, skip the education, but I really enjoyed the work that Hirsch did here.
Not a collection for everyone, but one that I think many will enjoy. It is not only useful and educational, it really does feature a lot of information on reading and understand poetry. People read poems like this to find the strength to go on. This collection does a wonderful job of enforcing that idea.
Poetry is something that I get a surprising amount out questions about working in bookstores. Besides the summer reading lists books or the newest best sellers from Youtube stars, I am asked alot to recommend poems for people going through difficult times. Customers seem to want poems to help them with the emotions they are feeling, but really don't know what they want, or even what to look for. Some are dealing with loss, some feel lost, and some have lost that loving feeling, to paraphrase a song. Poems though are very personal. What speaks to me, another might think of as corny, or immature, or anything but consoling or equal to what they are feeling. We all universally have the same feelings, but how we express, share and deal with our emotions are universally different. Edward Hirsch, poet, commentator and editor of 100 Poems To Break Your Heart, understands this. In this collection Hirsch offers a variety of poems stretching across the years dealing with love, loss, light and looking forward, breaking the heart to make it mend.
The introduction to the book shares thoughts on the power of words to makes us both feel, and feel better. Poems might break barriers in our mind, letting in thoughts we don't want, but from them, we learn more about ourselves and our resilience. The poems range for the end of the nineteenth century, to a few years ago. The usual players are here, William Wordsworth, Keats, Primo Levi. Some of the newer poets include Carolyn Creedon, Lucia Perillo, and Afaa Michael Weaver. The theme is breaking one's heart, but the subject matter covers quite a few different ideas. Death of course is a major subject. The death of love, and relationships not quite dying, not quite living, is another subject that has quite a bit written about. Some are just misery, be it about the human existence or the sadness that is just the world. Some really don't hold up, but that is common in all collections, as in nothing can be 100% for anyone, especially in the arts. Again what I find comforting, others might find cold and or uninteresting.
Each poems is it' own chapter with the poem broken down to explain what might be missed by a casual reader, and why the poem delivers what it does. There is some biographical looks at the poet's life, the work's reception, other comments about it, and what Hirsch thinks. I liked this a lot as always wonder if I am missing something in a poem, and might help me to explain to customers why this book might be just what they are looking for. The commentary does make the book bigger than people might like, and there could be some people who just want sad poems, skip the education, but I really enjoyed the work that Hirsch did here.
Not a collection for everyone, but one that I think many will enjoy. It is not only useful and educational, it really does feature a lot of information on reading and understand poetry. People read poems like this to find the strength to go on. This collection does a wonderful job of enforcing that idea.
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