My Last Door - Softcover

Bishop, Wendy

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0938078968 ISBN 13: 9780938078968

Publisher: Anhinga Press, 2007

Synopsis

Poetry. "[O]ne feels that these poems accrue to the sum of a life, a life lived with absolute attention and fierce presence. Nothing is left out. This is Bishop's Last Door. She has walked bravely through it and--how lucky for us--she has left it open to her vast and compelling world"--Frank X. Gaspar. Wendy Bishop was an internationally known writer and researcher in the field of rhetoric and composition as well as a widely published poet. She died in 2003.

About this title

About the Author

Wendy Bishop, Ph.D., was a Kellogg W. Hunt distinguished professor of English at Florida State University. She was a highly respected teacher and internationally recognized researcher in the field of rhetoric and composition, as well as a widely published poet and literary author. She was the author and/or editor of 22 scholarly books and several poetry chapbooks, in addition to numerous articles and short stories. She was a much sought-after presenter and speaker at professional conferences. She served as chair of the Conference on College Composition and Communication and as a co-vice president and member of the board of directors for the Associated Writing Programs (AWP). She died in 2003.

Review

Love, sex, marriage, children, birds, animals, the moon and stars, books, history, myth, life, life, life. These are what the reader finds in this abundant book but more, so much more that one feels these poems accrue to the sum of a life, a life lived with absolute attention and fierce presence. Nothing is left out. We range from Bismarck, North Dakota to Heraklion; we suffer the plagues of Biblical Egypt, and we dream of apple pie before a kitchen stove in winter. The scope here, both in formal and open verse, is astonishing. We are fabulous beasts, Bishop declares. And she is the fabulist who ranges far and wide over the earth. This is Bishop's Last Door. She has walked bravely through it, and how lucky for us she has left it open to her vast and compelling world. --Frank X. Gaspar

I like to think of Wendy floating perpetually in midair, member of an aerial troupe of free spirits, creating soaring and swooping freeform arabesques with energy, grace, and beauty. Working without a net, Wendy demonstrated again and again that work is play, play is work. As I have read and reread Wendy's work, I have come to understand, ever anew, the truth that has been here all along in plain sight. If we love what we're doing, work is play, play is work. A prodigious output, such as Wendy's, seems overwhelming if thought of as work, inevitable if treated as fun. Her works and deeds live on. --Lynn Z. Bloom

Edition details

• Publisher: Anhinga Press
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 0938078968
• ISBN 13: 9780938078968
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 236