Public Libraries of Suffolk County, New York

Synthesizing gravity, selected prose, Kay Ryan ; edited and with an introduction by Christian Wiman

eng

no index present

non fiction

Synthesizing gravity

Kay Ryan ; edited and with an introduction by Christian Wiman

selected prose

"Synthesizing Gravity gathers for the first time a thirty-year selection of Kay Ryan's probings into aesthetics, poetics, and the mind in pursuit of art. A bracing collection of critical prose, book reviews, and her private, previously unpublished soundings of poems and poets-including Robert Frost, Stevie Smith, Marianne Moore, William Bronk, and Emily Dickinson-Synthesizing Gravity bristles with Ryan's crisp wit, her keen off-kilter insights, and her appetite and appreciation for the genuine. Among essays like "Radiantly Indefensible," "Notes on the Danger of Notebooks," and "The Abrasion of Loneliness," are piquant pieces on the virtues of emptiness, forgetfulness, and other under-loved concepts. This generous collection of Ryan's distinctive thinking gives us a surprising look into the mind of an American master"--, Provided by publisher

A consideration of poetry -- Derichment -- I go to AWP -- Specks -- Notes on the danger of notebooks -- Do you like it? -- The authority of lightness -- Inedible melons -- Fidget and gnash -- I demand to speak with God -- Wang-pang-woo-poo-woof-woof -- The trail of the hunted wolf -- Only doubts -- Flying -- The abrasion of loneliness -- On a poem by Hopkins -- Radiantly indefensible -- All love all beauty -- On a poem by Dickinson -- No time for anything but repetition -- The end of the party -- All the nothing -- Listening to Williams -- Con and pro -- The double -- Reading before breakfast -- To be a miniature is to be swallowed by a miniature whale -- Against influence -- On forgetting -- The edges of time -- The poet takes a walk -- My house

adult