In a Fine Frenzy: Poets Respond to Shakespeare

by David Starkey (Editor), Paul J. Willis (Editor)

Showcasing poems by more than ninety contemporary American poets, In a Fine Frenzy reveals what Shakespeare's poetic children have made of their inheritance. Particularly interested in Viola, Miranda, Prospero, Desdemona, Iago, Lear, Cordelia, Hamlet, Horatio, and Ophelia, the poets respond to the sonnets, the comedies, the tragedies, the romances, and, to a lesser degree, Shakespeare the man. In so doing they reveal the aspects of his work most currently captivating to modern writers. Those who cherish Shakespeare's mercurial wit will delight in the rapid shifts, from grief to hilarity, so characteristic of the bard himself. Comic poems about tragedies follow decidedly somber poems about comedies. Single poems contain multiple emotional twists and turns. Some pay homage; most interact directly with the original Shakespearean text. Collectively, they corroborate Ben Jonson's assertion that Shakespeare is not of an age, but for all time.

Genres: Poetry

246 pages, Paperback

First published April 23, 2005

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.

David Starkey directs the creative writing program at Santa Barbara City College.
Among his poetry collections are Starkey's Book of States (Boson Books, 2007), Adventures of the Minor Poet (Artamo Press, 2007), Ways of Being Dead: New and Selected Poems (Artamo, 2006), David Starkey's Greatest Hits (Pudding House, 2002) and Fear of Everything, winner of Palanquin Press's Spring 2000 chapbook contest. A Few Things You Should Know about the Weasel will be published by the Canadian press Biblioasis next year.
In addition, over the past twenty years he has published more than 400 poems in literary journals such as American Scholar, Antioch Review, Beloit Poetry Journal, Cutbank, Faultline, Greensboro Review, The Journal, Massachusetts Review, Mid-American Review, Nebraska Review, Notre Dame Review, Poet Lore, Poetry East, South Dakota Review, Southern Humanities Review, Southern Poetry Review, Sycamore Review, Texas Review, and Wormwood Review. He has also written two textbooks: Creative Writing: Four Genres in Brief (Bedford/St. Martin's, 2008) and Poetry Writing: Theme and Variations (McGraw-Hill, 1999). With Paul Willis, he co-edited In a Fine Frenzy: Poets Respond to Shakespeare (Iowa, 2005), and he is the editor of Living Blue in the Red States (Nebraska, 2007). Keywords in Creative Writing, which he co-authored with the late Wendy Bishop, was published in 2006 by Utah State University Press.

Reviews

[Kitty · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of the poems are delightful, some would be even more delightful should one know the references. I am sad that this book was withdrawn from our library. Perhaps there was a fear of "bardolatry" or hero worship. Sad to think that "Poems for Shakespeare" issued as a chapbook anthology series in the 1970's and 80's is now difficult to find.
I found it refreshing to have an alternative to West Side Story, or yet another film version of star-crossed lovers, or Hamlet... and enjoyed the introduction which mentions 21st century America meets Elizabethan England -- with an amount of Ophelia poems ("O. fills the heart with tenderness" -- Samuel Johnson) that would have "drowned this entire book". The theory is that She seems to possess a passion and an intellect bottled up and squandered... disregarded, marginalized, hemmed in by a host of manipulative men... she has become a potent and tragic, modern, feminist symbol.
Perhaps someone will add to the meagre use of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and "Much Ado About Nothing" .
Poems of hommage, poems that interact directly with the text (I particularly enjoyed Harryette Mullen's "Dim Lady"), parody, talk-backs (How Mother Courage Saves Desdemona) or exploration of a given character.
Prologue: Shakespeare's Wages: Marvin Bell
Part I: The Sonnets
Interlude: My Students, Ron Koertge
Part II: The Comedies
Interlude: Shakespeare as a Waiter: BJ Ward
Part II : The Tragedies (and Histories)
Interlude: As If: Jim Peterson
Part IV: Hamlet
Interlude: Shakespeare's Eyebrows: Sylvia Adams
Part V: The Romances
Epilogue: Whatever Light, Stephen Corey

[Michael P. · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is a commonplace that poetry anthologies are uneven, and so do I find this book. However, I am well aware that the poems I like the least are likely to be the poems that others like the most. I find the work very strong, overall, and mostly well focused on the subject. I think having such a strong subject helps the poets keep their poems on something that interests me, and no doubt that contributes to my warm feeling towards this book. Some barely mention the response figure, and most of those are the poems I like the least. Too many are really about a certain painting of Ophelia, and not about Shakespeare's Ophelia - I'm on to you. But on balance, this is a very nice collection.