Category: Best Books

Book of the Year: Collected Poems by W. H. Auden, edited by Edward Mendelson (Modern Library).

This one is unavoidable. You can’t get around it. You have to go through it.… continue reading...

Book of the Year: Not for Specialists: New & Selected Poems by W. D. Snodgrass (BOA Editions).

What happened to Snodgrass? After winning the 1960 Pulitzer Prize for his first book, the “confessional school” landmark Heart’s Needle, his career stalled.… continue reading...

Book of the Year: The Collected Poems (1943-2004) of Richard Wilbur (Harcourt)

Runners-Up: Safest by Michael Donaghy (Picador)

Who is the greatest living American poet?… continue reading...

Book of the Year: The Collected Poems of Donald Justice (Knopf)

Runner-Up: Second Space by Czeslaw Milosz (Ecco). Inner Voices: Selected Poems by Richard Howard (FSG).… continue reading...

Book of the Year: The Collected Poems of Robert Lowell, edited by Frank Bidart and David Gewanter (FSG)

Runners-Up: The Collected Poems of Ted Hughes, edited by Paul Keegan (FSG); “I Am”: The Selected Poetry of John Clare, edited by Jonathan Bate (FSG)

The story of the year was summed up in two words: Robert Lowell.… continue reading...