Middle Kingdom

by Adrienne Su

Middle Kingdom, Adrienne Su's first collection of poems, explores American identity in terms of language, geography, and personal history. Starting in Georgia, the poems travel to New York, New England, China, Mexico, and other locales in the search for a sense of place.

Genres: Poetry

80 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1997

Reviews

[Regine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Promising. And I did enjoy “In Mexico City.” When she finds her footing, her voice will warm and strengthen.

[Bryan Worra · Rating 5 out of 5]

Adrienne Su is one of those poets in contemporary Asian America I think is sadly underrated and underappreciated. I regard her Middle Kingdom as my favorite of her books, because I can see a lot of where she's come from and will go in future collections.

Middle Kingdom taught me a great deal of how I would write my poetry around the early 2000s. Some techniques I would use, others I would not. But some of her pieces I particular enjoy are "Savannah Crabs," "Miss Chang is Missing," and "PIRANEX" which in was a key influence on my poem 'A Hmong Goodbye'. Middle Kingdom influenced how I structured my first book, On the Other Side of the Eye.

Su's Middle Kingdom has poems that are very easy to get into but in most cases have a significant and rewarding number of layers and levels that should earn her a much stronger position in Asian American arts and letters. But I always look forward to her next collections ever since this book.

[Lawrence Berger · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good book, well organized well-crafted but a bit too technical for my taste. Like a lot of "educated" poets, Ms. Su seems to spend a great deal of energy making sure the lines are properly punctuated, the uses of dashes and tense act. In my opinion she losses some of the power in her voice because of this and that’s sad because from what I see in this book she could easily be considered the Amer/Asian version of a Dr. Mya Angelou or Dorothy Parker. I do think she could be seen as THAT GOOD if so much attention had not been paid to the technical issues of how it might look on the page. I hope to read more of her work for a better idea of her voice.

[Kirsten · Rating 5 out of 5]

As with any collection, I like Su's work because I connect with her subjects and her use of language. What stands out beyond that is her deep mastery of form; the structures and rhymes are so inherent that I was only aware of them afterwards, sometimes on a second reading. That's remarkable.