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| Late Wife: Poems (Southern Messenger Poets Series) | 
| Author: Claudia Emerson
Publisher: Louisiana State University Press
Category: Book
List Price: $16.95
Buy New: $9.49
You Save: $7.46 (44%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  11 reviews
Sales Rank: 155241
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 54
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3
Dimensions (in): 8.7 x 5.4 x 0.4
ISBN: 0807130842
Dewey Decimal Number: 811.54
EAN: 9780807130841
ASIN: 0807130842
Publication Date: September 30, 2005
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
Winner of the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. In Late Wife, a woman explores her disappearance from one life and reappearance in another as she addresses her former husband, herself, and her new husband in a series of epistolary poems. Though not satisfied in her first marriage, she laments vanishing from the life she and her husband shared for years. She then describes the unexpected joys of solitude during her recovery and emotional convalescence. Finally, in a sequence of sonnets, she speaks to her new husband, whose first wife died from lung cancer. The poems highlight how the speaker's rebeginning in this relationship has come about in part because of two couples' respective losses. The most personal of Claudia Emerson's poetry collections, Late Wife is both an elegy and a celebration of a rich present informed by a complex past.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 6 more reviews...
One of my best reads of the year July 18, 2008
Claudia Emerson, Late Wife (Louisiana State University Press, 2005)
I've had very little patience with review-writing for the past six weeks or so, and thus I let this review go unconscionably long (I finished the book on April 30th and am writing this on June 10th). Thus, I've forgotten most of the phrases I was turning over in my mind. I do know, however, they all involved heaping a great deal of praise on Late Wife, Claudia Emerson's most recent book and the winner of the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. I often find myself wondering what the judges were thinking giving the prize to book X instead of book Y; not in this case. The details may be a little fuzzy in my head this far after the fact, but the book itself is pure gold, that much I remember. Emerson has a wonderful eye for detail and that all-too-rare quality in a poet of not letting the story get in the way of the description:
"I'd run that course/so many times I imagined myself/a goat encircling an invisible stake//of the baseball diamond's off-season/desolation, scoreboard blank before/the lightening sky." ("The Practice Cage")
That, right there, is some language, folks. This is a book you want to read. Likely to be on my ten best reads of the year list. ****
Well Worth a Careful Read April 16, 2008
I read about this collection by Claudia Emerson on a list of recent Pulitzer winners, and its marital themes appealed to me, so I gave it a try. These poems seem deceptively simple upon first reading, but as I've reread and lingered over them, they have grown deep roots. There is indeed a lot going on under the surface here.
The first two sections of this slim volume offer restrained yet poignant snapshots of a marriage viewed in retrospect--domestic moments that serve as subtle metaphors for a failing relationship. For instance, Emerson describes various homes that she and her husband occupied--houses that appear sound on the surface, but that include occupants like spiders, bees, bats, and termites, suggesting a marriage that is internally unsound. "Natural History Exhibits," for example, describes the newlywed poet opening up her silverware drawer to find a coiled snake. Rather than killing it, she hesitates and eases the drawer shut, letting the snake exit the way it came, but washing "every fork, spoon, and knife" afterwards. Her misgivings and her attempt to overlook the event mirror her handling of her early marital regrets. Another recurring image involves trapped birds--an orphaned cedar waxwing, a hawk caught in a batter's cage, and, in "A Bird in the House," the poet herself as a bird... the displaced "late wife" that her ex-husband's new wife chases out.
In the collection's final section, Emerson opens a window on her current relationship--one haunted by the ghost of her beloved's deceased "late wife," yet ultimately hopeful. In "Leave No Trace," a conscientious hiking trip becomes a meaningful metaphor for the subtle footprints we can't help but leave in each others' lives, yet Emerson's eyes are fixed confidently on her companion "on the trail just ahead."
This lovely, empathic collection is well worth a careful reading.
Poignant September 28, 2006
This author knows how to capture the nuances of life that most of us can relate to. I found that I could not put this book down. I will be re-reading this approachable "story" many times.
Wonderful September 21, 2006
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
I was a student of Claudia Emerson's at Mary Washignton College, and find her ability to honest and genuine in the classroom translates in her work. I remember her discussing "Late Wife" just as her previous collection "Pinion" was released. It is exciting to see the conversations she had among her students, now present in the art. My favorite poem is her metaphoric look at the batting cage and the hawk escpaing. Perhaps, because I have run around the fields myself, or maybe, because I relate to the universality of feeling like exhibition, and desiring to be the hawk with its talons and break free. She is a wonderful poet, and I look forward to reading every word she writes.
A Word Is Worth A Thousand Pictures September 8, 2006
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Claudia Emerson's precise use of words to convey images and to stimulate reflection is an artform. The simplicity of the poems and their ease in reading them mask the depth that is in each. This is key to a poet's success. The ability to appeal to all audiences by conveying a clear picture, yet not giving away too much, allows for the preservation of the reader's ability to use their own imagination. Imagination is the precursor for reflection. When room is made for reflection, each poem takes on a life of their own and the experience becomes unique for each reader and a connection is made. Connection is what poetry is all about. Not only did I make strong connections with these poems, but I truly enjoyed them just for the pure pleasure of reading them. The descriptions and images were so beautifully conjured through the artistic use of words that like admiring a great painting, they encourage you to be artistic as well.
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