Collected Poems

Surprisingly neglected, especially in the academy, Schuyler will soon be recognized as one of the most gifted poets of his generation. The deluge of doctoral dissertations cannot be far off; I encourage readers to beat the rush.

This collection should establish Schuyler as one of the great poets of his generation. I particularly admire his tautness--precise names and descriptions, inventive phrases--as well as his flexibility--a wide-ranging eye and ear and a free-flowing memory. Throughout these poems there lurks a clear intention to inform, to connect, to synthesize. I look forward to returning to this book many times for refreshment and illumination.

These sparkling poems mimic in their movements the springtime light that's always raining down around this poet, despite whatever woes he might have had. Read the long "Morning of the Poem" and tell me it isn't one of the most moving poems in the history of poetry.

This wonderful collection brings together a sizeable collection of James Schuyler's poetry. Schuyler was one of the New York Poets (along with O'Hara, Olson & others), but unlike the other poets of this group, he focuses on aspects of nature-- from a vase filled with tulips to the expanse of the outdoors. Schuyler sees in nature the ultimate metaphor for constant change and marvels about how remarkable the ordinariness of life is if looked at closely. His poetry is an examination of the transience of existence, a look at how the past and present can be so easily considered at the same time. In Schuyler's world a moment is always multitudinous-- filled with many things happening at any given second of that moment. This volume is a wonderful addition to any modern poetry collection. If you like the poetry of Elizabeth Bishop, Randall Jarrell, George Oppen, or Lorrine Neidecker you are bound to enjoy Schuyler's work.

I'm shocked that no one else has posted a review of this book. If you care at all about poetry in the latter half of the century just ended you cannot ignore Schuyler, and here is his poetry -- he was also a fine novelist -- *complete,* and at a bargain price. Schuyler is often compared to his "New York School" compatriot Frank O'Hara -- in that both could be called poets of the present moment, of immediacy -- and to Elizabeth Bishop -- with whom he shares an eye for detail -- but he is far more unflinching in his subjective confrontation with the objective world than either of these analogues: less anxious than O'Hara to be ever off into the next sensation, he is also less willing than is Bishop to elaborate, embroider, or buff the object as seen. Schuyler not only records the looks of weathers, fields, rooms, gardens, friends, he renders (often with shattering poignancy) the seismic bounce of one's response to the things and persons of this world. His is a poetry of unprecedentedly unswerving honesty, as brave as that of any confessional but without the cloying sense that the poet is doing anything unusual or exemplary, and without the sense that anything said or done will be forgiven. Schuyler is deservedly well-known for his long poems -- "The Crystal Lithium," "Hymn to Life," "The Morning of the Poem," "A Few Days" -- but he is equally to be treasured for sequences like "The Payne Whitney Poems," an account of mental incarceration that is terrifyingly offhand and funny, and for the many smaller, gemlike poems whose production was, for Schuyler, apparently as inevitable as breathing, while that lasted. Anyone who loves poetry should know these poems; there will be no others like them.