Configurations: New & Selected Poems, 1958-1998 - Softcover

Major, Clarence

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1556590903 ISBN 13: 9781556590900

Publisher: Copper Canyon Press, 1998

Synopsis

Finalist for the National Book Award

Drawing his most outstanding work from nine previous volumes of award-winning poetry, Clarence Major had added a substantial body of new work to present a clear assessment of his forty-year career. By turns humorous and serious, Major is always richly lyrical while remaining precise in his observations. Line by line, his poems insist upon their own integrity, driven on by music as equally inspired by blues and jazz as it is by the Cantos of Ezra Pound.

Born in Atlanta and raised in Chicago, Clarence Major is the author of eight previous volumes of poetry, eight novels, including Dirty Bird Blues (originally published in HC by Mercury House), several collections of short stories and nonfiction, and editor of two acclaimed anthologies of African-American literature. He teaches at the University of California, Davis.

"Like the finest blues, Clarence Major is, by turns, hypnotic, exotic, and healthily erotic."—Al Young

"[Clarence Major] writes poetry with the resistant, angular surface of tumbled brick. As if the poem had been literally smashed. An improvisational, jazz-like quality. Some tough, sharp observations."—Kirkus Reviews

"Passionate [and] controlled lyricism. . . The prevailing tonality of the poetry is quiet, almost philosophical."—Library Journal

About this title

Review

"Death ... is not all / she's cracked up to be," Clarence Major announces in "Love Against Death"--and indeed, the rest of Configurations makes a valiant effort to knock the old girl down a peg or two. Death may be a constant companion in this volume, but she's never allowed to take control; for this poet, you must accept mortality--not let it haunt you--to be truly alive. Major's first collection, Swallow the Lake, won the National Council for the Arts Award in 1970. He has gone on to produce eight well-received volumes, all of which are represented--along with many uncollected works--in this striking overview of his career thus far. While these poems are born out of the William Carlos Williams school of plain speech, they are equally inflected by bebop's syncopated rhythms and improvisational style. One notices both in "Un Poco Loco," in which the speaker's "disconnected thoughts" riff against the steady rhythm of the grandmother preparing dinner, à la Williams: "To keep going, I think / disconnected thoughts: / Chatter. Chew-tobacco. / Phoenicians. Rednecks. / To keep going I watch / my grandmother hold / the chicken by its legs-- / bauk bauk bauk!"

Throughout these poems, Major is adamant about the need to hold onto hope even while we confront our mortality. His poems approach this in numerous ways--through bursts of metaphoric images, through patterns of music and formal rhythmic structure, and through narrative interaction with others on the same inescapable journey. In the book's strongest pieces, such as "Love Against Death," all of these devices work together with moving results:

With our love, dear, we fight death,
and we fight unclear meanings.
They are like air released
in a broken scream--
at three in the morning
when your legs feel wooden.

Embrace night odors.
Embrace each other.
Rub your hands
against the roughness
of the whitewashed wall.
For now, you are alive.

In Configurations, Major fights both death and unclear meanings in language of uncompromising clarity and precision. For now, he seems to suggest, this is what it means to be alive. --A.J. Rathbun

From the Back Cover

"Drawing his most outstanding work from eight previous volumes of award winning poetry, Clarence Major has added a substantial body of new work to present a clear assessment of his forty-year career.  By turns humorous and serious, Major is always richly lyrical while remaining visual and precise in his observations.  Line by line, his poems insists upon their own integrity, driven on by music as equally inspired by blues and jazz as it is by the Cantos of Ezra Pound."

"Like the finest blues, Clarence Major is, by turns, hypnotic, exotic, and healthily erotic."--AL YOUNG

"Clarence Major writes poetry with the resistant, angular surface of tumbled brick.  As if the poem has been literally smashed.  An improvisational, jazz-like quality.  Some tough, sharp observations..."--KIRKUS REVIEWS

Edition details

• Publisher: Copper Canyon Press
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 1556590903
• ISBN 13: 9781556590900
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 375