[Robert J. Clawson]

Heather McHugh has an essay in the current (Jan) American Poetry Review that I found delightful. If you value roots and wordplay, she's the Queen, but experiencing her opening it up further in 17th Century lyrics, satiric and otherwise, is a joy. Good fun, even in the footnotes.

Bob

[Richard Wakefield]

Bob:
I am an admirer of McHugh's poetry, and I found the essay delightful for a dozen or so paragraphs -- then it became a little cloying. I began to wish she would leave even one suggestive line of word/sound play unexplored and get on with the essay... But given the plodding prose of most criticism, that's not much of a complaint. It strikes me that in APR the language of the essays is often more highly charged than the language of the poetry.
I'm eager to hear others' opinions.
RPW

[Robert J. Clawson]

[quote]Originally posted by Richard Wakefield:
Bob:

"I began to wish she would leave even one suggestive line of word/sound play unexplored and get on with the essay..."

Yeah, it didn't turn me off, however. McHugh has said, "I'm often accused of being too clever. I have to choke it down." She's not even close to choking it in this example. You found her at full bore.

Utterly Shameless O'Clawson

[Lisa Barnett]

Frankly, I gave up on APR some years ago...but it sounds like the Heather McHugh article might be worth looking at.

Lisa