Compass Card
| Author: | George, Emery E. | |
| Year: | 2003 | |
| Pages: | 156 | |
| ISBN: | 0-7734-3432-1 978-0-7734-3432-5 | |
| Price: | $139.95 + shipping | |
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The diapason of the present volume is joy and hope in our new century and millennium. The one hundred poems explore the formal as well as mimetic possibilities of the villanelle. Among subjects, music and art are prominent. There are cycles of poems in homage to Bach, Mozart, the renaissance German sculptor Tilman Riemenschneider, the late Joseph Brodsky, and one of the startling minds of our century, Arthur Koestler. The poems aim at being an experience in sound, but they also invite us to think. Problems of perception are broached, and social and political comment is by no means absent. Song and comment reach one of their peaks in “Exemplary Tale” (no. 67), a poem on two young people in love, one a Croat, the other a Serb, talented opera singers and both dedicating themselves to working toward a more peaceful future.
Reviews
“In the hands of a craftsman, the villanelle assumes a life of its own, free of stuttering thymes and obedient to the rules of pure poetry. . . . Without a doubt, Emery George has mastered the form and has contributed significantly to the world’s treasure trove of villanelles. . . . The range of subject matter is indeed impressive, and the reader is constantly reminded that under the musicality lies profound thought. There is also a playfulness and a sense of humor that accompanies serious intent. . . . There are no false notes, and the rhymes fit comfortably within the poet’s web.” – World Literature Today