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The Sacrifice
Great narrative - scarce item in the Marketplace
- GenresPoetry
63 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1983
1 person is currently reading
203 people want to read
About the author
Frank Bidart
49 books141 followersFrank Bidart is the author of Metaphysical Dog (FSG, 2013), Watching the Spring Festival (FSG, 2008), Star Dust (FSG, 2005), Desire (FSG, 1997), and In the Western Night: Collected Poems 1965-90 (FSG, 1990). He has won many prizes, including the Wallace Stevens Award, the 2007 Bollingen Prize for American Poetry, and the National Book Critics Circle Award. He teaches at Wellesley College and lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
June 27, 2024
Consider me warned. I had acquired a number of texts by Bidart over the last few years. There were tremors of doubt, mocking echoes of obscurity and density abounded, if only in my interior simpering stutter.
I enjoyed the alignment with Nijinsky and allusions to the Great War and Nietzsche: was this establishing parallels with the protagonist’s mother issues? We shifted down and approached Augustine and cancer, neither forgiving in this instance. There are mental health issues, and a cat is killed.
I’m not sure if I’ll continue with the poet.
I enjoyed the alignment with Nijinsky and allusions to the Great War and Nietzsche: was this establishing parallels with the protagonist’s mother issues? We shifted down and approached Augustine and cancer, neither forgiving in this instance. There are mental health issues, and a cat is killed.
I’m not sure if I’ll continue with the poet.
September 3, 2022
i know people's faults because in my soul i have committed them!!!!!!! the life of vaslav nijinsky is a story on its own and the guilt of simply being alive is loud and. yeah this was good
February 5, 2019
Frank Bidart’s work is endlessly challenging, and he promises as much through the epigraph of The Sacrifice, which borrows from Hegel: “… the speculative Good Friday in place of the historic Good Friday. Good Friday must be speculatively re-established in the whole truth and harshness of its Godforsakenness.” In this collection, the eponymous “sacrifice” is more riddle than triumphant truth: at what point does redemption constitute erasure of the past? And what’s more: what if what is being redeemed is the very stuff of our daily existence – and our search for a “metaphysics” (albeit futile) also constitutes a search for erasure of ourselves? As Bidart writes in “Confessional”: “Truly to feel “forgiveness,” / to forgive her IN MY HEART, / meant erasing ME…” (47).
Sacrifice, then, presents itself as a problem in this book. What is most laudatory about Bidart’s method here is precisely how he presents a philosophical problem – a conceptual knot – through the medium of poetry. Bidart’s central technique in this collection is in the use of stanza “mosaics” wherein stanzas change speakers, styles or even eras without warning, lending the reader a sense of slippage, or even truth’s relativism: “Still gripped by the illusion of a horizon… the Nineteenth Century’s / guilt, World War One, / was danced / by Nijinsky on January 19, 1919…” is followed by this stanza: “…I am now reading Ecce Homo. Nietzsche / is angry with me…” (“The War of Vaslav Nijinsky”). With the understated pomp of the ellipses, we have switched viewpoints, and are now privy to Nijinsky’s mind. But if we believe the space between stanzas to be a reliable marker of shifts, we are in for an unsettling surprise: “I must not regret; or judge; or / struggle to escape it … (the ruthless / ecstasy of) / CHANGE; “my endless RENEWAL”; BECOMING. / --That is Nietzsche.” So begins, on the second page of my copy, Bidart’s other tactic: the weaving of capital letters with quotations to indicate that the poem is a patchwork of other ideas: poets, journals, events that have come before. These are not new thoughts, Bidart seems to argue. If anything, the fact that these thoughts have been visited and revisited in many forms can only be testament to their philosophical value and resistance to closure. Thus, the book’s subtle argument unfolds, it may be worth looking at the problem of sacrifice from many angles: the last dance of Vaslav Nijinsky (“The War of Vaslav Nijinsky”), the death by cancer of a friend (“For Mary Ann Youngren”), the death of Bidart’s own mother (“Confessional”), the gruesome yet virtuous suicide of a stranger (“The Sacrifice”) and two translations from ancient traditions (“Catullus: Odi et amo” and “Genesis 1-2:4”).
Studying Bidart’s work as a poet, there is much to learn – though of chief interest here is his ability to lend different tonalities to lines such as “DO YOU FORGIVE ME?” and “WILL YOU MISS ME?” through the association of capital letters with Nietzsche’s philosophical work (“For Mary Ann Youngren”). Perhaps what separates Bidart from a cut-and-dry academic, then, is this: his willingness to view the authority we grant great philosophers as itself an ingredient in philosophy – and his willingness, then, to lend that authority to the everyday man or woman’s speech. In this way, Bidart has built a kind of “island of meaning” inside his book, wherein its internal parts remain tangled in self-reference, and each part refers to the vexing whole that is The Sacrifice. It is a short book, to be certain, but a heavy one – one that bores a deep hole in the experience of the reader. Unlike the scattered contemporary debut collection – sometimes a kind of exposé of a young poet’s versatility – Bidart’s work exhibits a master’s restraint. What Bidart writes of Nijinsky’s choreography may also be true, then, of his poetry: “There is MORAL here / about how LONG you must live with / the consequences of a SHORT action.”
Sacrifice, then, presents itself as a problem in this book. What is most laudatory about Bidart’s method here is precisely how he presents a philosophical problem – a conceptual knot – through the medium of poetry. Bidart’s central technique in this collection is in the use of stanza “mosaics” wherein stanzas change speakers, styles or even eras without warning, lending the reader a sense of slippage, or even truth’s relativism: “Still gripped by the illusion of a horizon… the Nineteenth Century’s / guilt, World War One, / was danced / by Nijinsky on January 19, 1919…” is followed by this stanza: “…I am now reading Ecce Homo. Nietzsche / is angry with me…” (“The War of Vaslav Nijinsky”). With the understated pomp of the ellipses, we have switched viewpoints, and are now privy to Nijinsky’s mind. But if we believe the space between stanzas to be a reliable marker of shifts, we are in for an unsettling surprise: “I must not regret; or judge; or / struggle to escape it … (the ruthless / ecstasy of) / CHANGE; “my endless RENEWAL”; BECOMING. / --That is Nietzsche.” So begins, on the second page of my copy, Bidart’s other tactic: the weaving of capital letters with quotations to indicate that the poem is a patchwork of other ideas: poets, journals, events that have come before. These are not new thoughts, Bidart seems to argue. If anything, the fact that these thoughts have been visited and revisited in many forms can only be testament to their philosophical value and resistance to closure. Thus, the book’s subtle argument unfolds, it may be worth looking at the problem of sacrifice from many angles: the last dance of Vaslav Nijinsky (“The War of Vaslav Nijinsky”), the death by cancer of a friend (“For Mary Ann Youngren”), the death of Bidart’s own mother (“Confessional”), the gruesome yet virtuous suicide of a stranger (“The Sacrifice”) and two translations from ancient traditions (“Catullus: Odi et amo” and “Genesis 1-2:4”).
Studying Bidart’s work as a poet, there is much to learn – though of chief interest here is his ability to lend different tonalities to lines such as “DO YOU FORGIVE ME?” and “WILL YOU MISS ME?” through the association of capital letters with Nietzsche’s philosophical work (“For Mary Ann Youngren”). Perhaps what separates Bidart from a cut-and-dry academic, then, is this: his willingness to view the authority we grant great philosophers as itself an ingredient in philosophy – and his willingness, then, to lend that authority to the everyday man or woman’s speech. In this way, Bidart has built a kind of “island of meaning” inside his book, wherein its internal parts remain tangled in self-reference, and each part refers to the vexing whole that is The Sacrifice. It is a short book, to be certain, but a heavy one – one that bores a deep hole in the experience of the reader. Unlike the scattered contemporary debut collection – sometimes a kind of exposé of a young poet’s versatility – Bidart’s work exhibits a master’s restraint. What Bidart writes of Nijinsky’s choreography may also be true, then, of his poetry: “There is MORAL here / about how LONG you must live with / the consequences of a SHORT action.”
January 26, 2022
[...]
the Nineteenth Century's
guilt, World War One,
was danced
by Nijinsky on January 19, 1919.
[...]
She is angry, as I am angry.
We are both right - ; and both angry. . .
Soon she feels guilty that shehas failed me - ;
and I toofeel guilty. . .
The GUILT comes from NOWHERE.
Neither of us has done wrong!
[...]
My brother was insane. He died
in a lunatic asylum.
The reason I know I am NOT insane
is because, unlike my brother,
I feel guilt.
The insane do not feel guilt.
[...]
Nietzsche was insane. He knew
we killed God.
. . . This is the end of the story:
though He was dead, God was clever
and strong. God struck back, -
AND KILLED US.
[...]
Should the World
regret the War? Should I
REGRET MY LIFE?
. . . Let our epigraph be:
In Suffering, and Nightmare,I woke at last
to my own nature.
[...]
The second part of my ballet
Le Sacre du Printemps
is called "THE SACRIFICE"
A young girl, a virgin, is chosen
to die
so that the spring will return, -
so that her Tribe (free
from "pity," "introspection," "remorse")
out of her blood
can renew itself.
[...]
I said to myself:
You must join YOUR GUILT
to the WORLD'S GUILT.
There is no answer to your life.
You are insane; or evil.
. . . Let this be the Body
through which the War has passed.
[...]
Now that the War has been over
two months, at times I almost
doubt if it existed - ;
in truth,
it never existed, -
. . . BECAUSE IT HAS NEVER BEEN OVER.
[...]
Even now, I can see the World
wheeling on its Axis. . . I
shout at it: -
C E A S E.
C H A N G E,
-OR C E A S E.
The World said right back: -
I must chop down the tree of life
to make coffins.
[...]
Frightened to eat with a new set of teeth;
exhausted by the courage the insane have shown;
uncertain whether to REDEEM or to DESTROY THE EARTH,
- the Nineteenth Century's
guilt, World War One,
was danced
by Nijinsky on January 19, 1919.
* * *
[...]
Not long before she died,
she told me something
I had never heard: -
when I was nine or ten, early
in her second marriage,
she became pregnant; she said she
wanted to have the child. . .
She said that one day, when my stepfather
was playing golf, she was out walking the course
with him, and suddenly
a man fell from one of the trees
lining the fairway. . .
A group of men had been cutting limbs;
she saw one of them fall,
and for a long time
lie there screaming.
Later that day, she had a miscarriage.
After saying all this, she had a miscarriage.
After saying all this, she
looked at me insistently and said,
"I wanted to have the child."
But as she was telling me the story,
I kept thinking
THANK GOD THE MAN FELL,
THANK GOD SHE SAW HIM FALL AND HAD A MISCARRIAGE
AND THE CHILD DIED. . .
[...]
* * *
When Judas writes the history of SOLITUDE, -
. . . let him celebrate
Miss Mary Kenwood; who, without
help, placed her head in a plastic bag,
then locked herself
in a refrigerator.
*
- Six months earlier, after thirty years
teaching piano, she had watched
her mother slowly die of throat cancer.
Watched her want to die. . .
What once had given Mary life
in the end didn't want it.
Awake, her mother screamed for help to die.
- She felt
GUILTY. . . She knew that all men in these situations felt
innocent - ; helpless - ; yet guilty.
*
Christ knew the Secret. Betrayal
is necessary; as is woe for the betrayer.
The solution, Mary realized at last
must be brought out of my own body.
Wiping away our sins, Christ stained us with his blood - ;
to offer yourself, yet need betrayal, by Judas, before SHOULDERING
THE GUILT OF THE WORLD - ;
. . . Give me the courage not to need Judas.
*
When Judas writes the history of solitude.
let him record
that to the friend who opened
the refrigerator, it seemed
death fought; before giving in.
the Nineteenth Century's
guilt, World War One,
was danced
by Nijinsky on January 19, 1919.
[...]
She is angry, as I am angry.
We are both right - ; and both angry. . .
Soon she feels guilty that shehas failed me - ;
and I toofeel guilty. . .
The GUILT comes from NOWHERE.
Neither of us has done wrong!
[...]
My brother was insane. He died
in a lunatic asylum.
The reason I know I am NOT insane
is because, unlike my brother,
I feel guilt.
The insane do not feel guilt.
[...]
Nietzsche was insane. He knew
we killed God.
. . . This is the end of the story:
though He was dead, God was clever
and strong. God struck back, -
AND KILLED US.
[...]
Should the World
regret the War? Should I
REGRET MY LIFE?
. . . Let our epigraph be:
In Suffering, and Nightmare,I woke at last
to my own nature.
[...]
The second part of my ballet
Le Sacre du Printemps
is called "THE SACRIFICE"
A young girl, a virgin, is chosen
to die
so that the spring will return, -
so that her Tribe (free
from "pity," "introspection," "remorse")
out of her blood
can renew itself.
[...]
I said to myself:
You must join YOUR GUILT
to the WORLD'S GUILT.
There is no answer to your life.
You are insane; or evil.
. . . Let this be the Body
through which the War has passed.
[...]
Now that the War has been over
two months, at times I almost
doubt if it existed - ;
in truth,
it never existed, -
. . . BECAUSE IT HAS NEVER BEEN OVER.
[...]
Even now, I can see the World
wheeling on its Axis. . . I
shout at it: -
C E A S E.
C H A N G E,
-OR C E A S E.
The World said right back: -
I must chop down the tree of life
to make coffins.
[...]
Frightened to eat with a new set of teeth;
exhausted by the courage the insane have shown;
uncertain whether to REDEEM or to DESTROY THE EARTH,
- the Nineteenth Century's
guilt, World War One,
was danced
by Nijinsky on January 19, 1919.
- The War of Vaslav Nijinsky
* * *
[...]
Not long before she died,
she told me something
I had never heard: -
when I was nine or ten, early
in her second marriage,
she became pregnant; she said she
wanted to have the child. . .
She said that one day, when my stepfather
was playing golf, she was out walking the course
with him, and suddenly
a man fell from one of the trees
lining the fairway. . .
A group of men had been cutting limbs;
she saw one of them fall,
and for a long time
lie there screaming.
Later that day, she had a miscarriage.
After saying all this, she had a miscarriage.
After saying all this, she
looked at me insistently and said,
"I wanted to have the child."
But as she was telling me the story,
I kept thinking
THANK GOD THE MAN FELL,
THANK GOD SHE SAW HIM FALL AND HAD A MISCARRIAGE
AND THE CHILD DIED. . .
[...]
- Confessional
* * *
When Judas writes the history of SOLITUDE, -
. . . let him celebrate
Miss Mary Kenwood; who, without
help, placed her head in a plastic bag,
then locked herself
in a refrigerator.
*
- Six months earlier, after thirty years
teaching piano, she had watched
her mother slowly die of throat cancer.
Watched her want to die. . .
What once had given Mary life
in the end didn't want it.
Awake, her mother screamed for help to die.
- She felt
GUILTY. . . She knew that all men in these situations felt
innocent - ; helpless - ; yet guilty.
*
Christ knew the Secret. Betrayal
is necessary; as is woe for the betrayer.
The solution, Mary realized at last
must be brought out of my own body.
Wiping away our sins, Christ stained us with his blood - ;
to offer yourself, yet need betrayal, by Judas, before SHOULDERING
THE GUILT OF THE WORLD - ;
. . . Give me the courage not to need Judas.
*
When Judas writes the history of solitude.
let him record
that to the friend who opened
the refrigerator, it seemed
death fought; before giving in.
- The Sacrifice
January 11, 2019
"Nijinsky invited guests to a recital at the Suvretta House Hotel.
When the audience was seated, he picked up a chair, sat down on it, and stared at them. Half an hour passed. Then he took a few rolls of black and white velvet and made a big cross the length of the room. He stood at the head of it, his arms opened wide. He said: "Now, I will dance your he War, which you did not prevent and for which you are responsible." his dance reflected battle, horror, catastrophe, apocalypse An observer wrote: "At the end, we were too much overwhelmed to applaud. We were looking at a corpse, and our silence was the silence that enfolds the dead."
There was a collection for the Red Cross. Tea was served. Nijinsky never again performed in public."
from "The War of Vaslav Nijinsky," by Frank Bidart
When the audience was seated, he picked up a chair, sat down on it, and stared at them. Half an hour passed. Then he took a few rolls of black and white velvet and made a big cross the length of the room. He stood at the head of it, his arms opened wide. He said: "Now, I will dance your he War, which you did not prevent and for which you are responsible." his dance reflected battle, horror, catastrophe, apocalypse An observer wrote: "At the end, we were too much overwhelmed to applaud. We were looking at a corpse, and our silence was the silence that enfolds the dead."
There was a collection for the Red Cross. Tea was served. Nijinsky never again performed in public."
from "The War of Vaslav Nijinsky," by Frank Bidart
July 15, 2022
mastery of form. slept-on genius
January 31, 2024
"I can understand the pleasures of War.
In War--
where killing is a virtue: camouflage
a virtue: revenge a virtue:
pity a weakness--
the world rediscovers
a guiltless prehistory
"civilization" condemns..."
In War--
where killing is a virtue: camouflage
a virtue: revenge a virtue:
pity a weakness--
the world rediscovers
a guiltless prehistory
"civilization" condemns..."
March 14, 2018
The war of vaslav nijinsky is so good honestly I’m getting obsessed with bidart really fast tbh
September 25, 2023
god said:
GOD MADE YOU. GOD DOES NOT CARE
IF YOU ARE “GUILTY” OR NOT.
I said:
I CARE IF I AM GUILTY!
I CARE IF I AM GUILTY!…
god was silent.
everything was SILENT.
*
for years she dreamed the cat
had dug
its claws into her thumbs:—
in the dream, she knew, somehow,
that it was dying; she tried
to help it,—
TO PUT IT OUT OF ITS MISERY,—
so she held her hands around its
neck, strangling it…
bewildered,
it looked at her,
KNOWING SHE LOVED IT—;
and she DID love it, which was
what was
so awful…
all it could do was
hold on,—
… AS
SHE HELD ON.
*
her plea, her need for forgiveness
seemed the attempt to obliterate
the ACTIONS, ANGERS, REFUSALS
that are how I
came to UNDERSTAND her—; me—;
my life…
truly to feel “forgiveness,”
to forgive her IN MY HEART,
meant erasing ME…
*
wiping away our sins, christ stained us with his blood—;
to offer yourself, yet need betrayal, by Judas, before SHOULDERING
THE GUILT OF THE WORLD—;
… give me the courage not to need Judas.
GOD MADE YOU. GOD DOES NOT CARE
IF YOU ARE “GUILTY” OR NOT.
I said:
I CARE IF I AM GUILTY!
I CARE IF I AM GUILTY!…
god was silent.
everything was SILENT.
*
for years she dreamed the cat
had dug
its claws into her thumbs:—
in the dream, she knew, somehow,
that it was dying; she tried
to help it,—
TO PUT IT OUT OF ITS MISERY,—
so she held her hands around its
neck, strangling it…
bewildered,
it looked at her,
KNOWING SHE LOVED IT—;
and she DID love it, which was
what was
so awful…
all it could do was
hold on,—
… AS
SHE HELD ON.
*
her plea, her need for forgiveness
seemed the attempt to obliterate
the ACTIONS, ANGERS, REFUSALS
that are how I
came to UNDERSTAND her—; me—;
my life…
truly to feel “forgiveness,”
to forgive her IN MY HEART,
meant erasing ME…
*
wiping away our sins, christ stained us with his blood—;
to offer yourself, yet need betrayal, by Judas, before SHOULDERING
THE GUILT OF THE WORLD—;
… give me the courage not to need Judas.
Read
September 28, 2025I had this sitting around I think because five years ago (or more) I saw a brief quotation from it online that I thought was good. I don't even know what that was now—these poems are all minimally competent, but they all strike me as mostly just limp prose (historical recitation in one case, therapymouthed autobiography in another, biblical paraphrase in a third) with line breaks and way too many ALL CAPS, as if the poet knew the words were unexceptional and wanted to make up for it by shouting.
Just looked it up and this guy won a Pulitzer. He's still alive which actually makes me feel a little less bad for being so hard on him. This is basically uninteresting but minimally competent middlebrow slop. Oh well. At least I can make some room on my bookshelf now.
Just looked it up and this guy won a Pulitzer. He's still alive which actually makes me feel a little less bad for being so hard on him. This is basically uninteresting but minimally competent middlebrow slop. Oh well. At least I can make some room on my bookshelf now.
November 5, 2022
“I CARE IF I AM GUILTY. I CARE IF I AM GUILTY” fucking HITS man
July 16, 2023
i lay back in the snow
October 6, 2016
You must join YOUR GUILT
to the WORLD'S GUILT.
There is no answer to your life.
You are insane; or evil.
...Let this be the Body
through which the War has passed.
to the WORLD'S GUILT.
There is no answer to your life.
You are insane; or evil.
...Let this be the Body
through which the War has passed.
July 11, 2024
I CARE IF I AM GUILTY!...
God was silent.
Everything was SILENT.
...
Let our epitaph be:
In suffering, and nightmare,
I woke at last
to my own nature.
He really knows how to capture the feeling of being guilty just for existing fr
God was silent.
Everything was SILENT.
...
Let our epitaph be:
In suffering, and nightmare,
I woke at last
to my own nature.
He really knows how to capture the feeling of being guilty just for existing fr
Read
August 8, 2024the rock that gives shade to one creature / for another creature just blocks the sun / this is a problem of being. I can imagine no / solution to this
January 28, 2016
Someone who writes "I must chop down the Tree of Life / to make coffins ..." has my attention. I've read epic poems but long poems are a rarity. Nevertheless, half of this volume is a single poem about Nijinsky. This book is a surprise on many such levels. I find that I want to become involved with the book, but that I cannot. I'm pulled toward the book but not allowed to become a part of it. The random and frequent use of CAPITALIZATION is quite off-putting. Perhaps because this book was written prior to email etiquette which labels such behaviour as shouting; but as a poet he should already be aware of such effects. I find it too much, too often, and thus detracting from the very points he tries to make by its usage. The book is steeped in religion; I am not. Perhaps that fuels my dissonance. The devout theologian may relish this work.
May 30, 2024
beautiful use of language, beautiful poem. one of my top 3 favorites for sure.
in 'the war of vaslav nijinsky', from vaslav's point of view, everything seems rational and simple. if you do something bad, if you think something bad, you should be punished in the eyes of god - but we are more than that. god forgives all, and is that a good or bad thing? should we divorce ourselves from what is perceived as good and bad by not only society, but basic instincts? do they even really matter at all, as long as there is some joy in our lives? from vaslavs point of view, if there is no guilt for wrongdoings, then there is no life. wrongdoings don't exist anymore if there is no guilt. and that then connects to the war.
vaslav believes humanity must suffer for the war, but if humanity does not feel guilt, can it even suffer? if there is no sorrow for what was done, was it wrong?
in 'the war of vaslav nijinsky', from vaslav's point of view, everything seems rational and simple. if you do something bad, if you think something bad, you should be punished in the eyes of god - but we are more than that. god forgives all, and is that a good or bad thing? should we divorce ourselves from what is perceived as good and bad by not only society, but basic instincts? do they even really matter at all, as long as there is some joy in our lives? from vaslavs point of view, if there is no guilt for wrongdoings, then there is no life. wrongdoings don't exist anymore if there is no guilt. and that then connects to the war.
vaslav believes humanity must suffer for the war, but if humanity does not feel guilt, can it even suffer? if there is no sorrow for what was done, was it wrong?
October 16, 2023
Saying that I LOVE Bidart's poems wouldn't be enough. The way he writes it's mesmerising, it makes you feel exactly the feelings he put into them. I have read basically all his works (and more then once), and I can assure you they have a big place in my heart. IF YOU HAVEN'T READ ANYTHING OF HIM GO DO IT RN!!
Read
August 21, 2007Poetry that disappeared like autumn haze
February 8, 2011
Bidart is freakishly good.
July 6, 2025
goes crazy especially if you were raised catholic
Read
April 21, 2017811.54 B584s 1983
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews