Averno: Poems
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Book Overview
WINNER OF THE NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE
Averno is a small crater lake in southern Italy, regarded by the ancient Romans as the entrance to the underworld. That place gives its name to Louise Gl ck's tenth collection: in a landscape turned irretrievably to winter, it is a gate or passageway that invites traffic between worlds while at the same time resisting their reconciliation. Averno is an extended lamentation, its long, restless poems no less spellbinding for being without conventional resoltution or consolation, no less ravishing for being savage, grief-stricken. What Averno provides is not a map to a point of arrival or departure, but a diagram of where we are, the harrowing, enduring present. Averno is a 2006 National Book Award Finalist for Poetry.Customer Reviews
Rated 5 starsEvocative and Earthly
Louise Gluck remains an elegant poet, able to evoke the mysteries of being crafted in the forms of gods while surviving our humanity. She is quick to capture our attention and lingers as we put her book aside in response to daily obligations.
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Rated 5 starsFast, well packaged delivery
The book "Averno" appeared almost immediately after I ordered it. The service was efficient and the packaging was secure.
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Rated 5 starsWhen I Think of Louise Gluck's Averno...
I can barely breathe. It's not because I'm a female in some kind of a swoon. It's because she never fails to tell the truth no matter how hard it might be to swallow. Also, most of the Master poets (among which Ms. Gluck surely is included) never, ever fail to tackle those dark, disturbing, complex places most of us refuse to even consider let alone pen as a work of art. As a result, this collection shines, literally, in the...
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Rated 4 starsSorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word
As Louise Gluck reminds us, Averno is a small lake, famous for being the entrance to the underworld. Her notoriety as a poet who will spare nothing to achieve perfection takes another corner here, as she jumps from angle to angle all the while drinking in the sad, almost preternaturally pertinent life ( and afterlife ) of the demi-goddess Persephone who, as the daughter of Demeter, wound up sold down the river to pleasure...
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