Collected Longer Poems

By Hayden Carruth

Book Overview

Hayden Carruth's poetry is distinguished by the indelible presence of passion, compassion, and radical philosophy. Collected Longer Poems gathers the poet's choice of his narrative work and poems in sequence, including the meditative poems on the rural northeast that have made him the most accessible "regional" poet since Robert Frost. Carruth's renowned technical genius is perfectly matched to his ear for spoken language and narrative structure. His observations of life are by turns caustic and hilarious.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 155659058X
• ISBN13: 9781556590580
• Release Date: November 1993
• Publisher: Copper Canyon Press
• Length: 240 Pages
• Weight: 1.20 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 6.1" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

More Lessons from the Master

W. H. Auden, in his introduction to 19th Century British Minor Poets, established five criteria for being major, of which a candidate must satisfy at least three and a half. The poet must be prolific, demonstrate "wide range in subject matter and treatment," evidence "originality of vision and style," show mastery of verse technique, and continue maturing as a poet until death. Hayden Carruth meets all these conditions, as his Collected Longer Poems demonstrates by itself; taken together with his Collected Shorter Poems (1992), it marks Carruth as a preeminent master. The poems were composed between 1957 and 1983 and have been published in various collections, only one previously unavailable except in a fine-press edition. Three are written in Carruth's trade-mark "paragraphs," rhymed, variably metered fifteen-line stanzas, including The Sleeping Beauty, the heart of Carruth's oeuvre to date. Other poems in the collection are written in sprawling Whitmanesque lines, tercets, free-verse lyrics, and loosened blank verse, the chosen form answering the demands of the subject matter. Few, if any, of Carruth's contemporaries--or immediate predecessors or followers--have demonstrated such extensive mastery.

An overlooked poet

This collection contains several of Carruth's longer poems, including "The Sleeping Beauty." I picked up this collection to read this poem in my studies and I was impressed. Carruth's poetry is interesting and sparks the imagination with his subtle and genuine style.