Thomas and Beulah [First issue, signed]

Rita Dove

ISBN 10: 0887480217 / ISBN 13: 9780887480218

Published by Carnegie Mellon, 1986

About this Item

First printing, first issue (with no mention of the Pulitzer prize). Simultaneous paperback edition. SIGNED by the author on the title page and dated by her 25 March 2018. Seller Inventory # 525

Bibliographic Details

Title: Thomas and Beulah [First issue, signed]

Publisher: Carnegie Mellon

Publication Date: 1986

Binding: Soft cover

Condition: Near Fine

Signed: Signed by Author(s)

Edition: 1st Edition

About this title

Synopsis:

A collection of poetry by Rita Dove.

Review:

The poems in this unusual book tell a story, forming a narrative almost like a realistic novel. Read in sequence as intended, they tell of the lives of a married black couple (not unlike Dove's own grandparents) from the early part of the century until their deaths in the 1960s, a period that spans the great migration of blacks from rural south to urban north. But this is merely the social backdrop to the story of a marriage. Two separate sequences offer two views of the couple's lives: the first, "Mandolin," consists of 23 poems giving Thomas's side, and "Canary in Bloom" gives Beulah's in 21 poems. Together they paint a detailed, poetically dense portrait of two lives in all their frailty, dignity and complexity. The collection was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 1987.