William Logan on Catherine Tufariello
 

Those of you who have been here for a very long time will remember Catherine Tufariello, who used to be a member here. She published a very good poetry book called Keeping My Name, but has not published another since then. Belatedly, Logan decided to review it, and miraculously he liked it. He manages to get in a few swipes at formalists in general while praising her, but the praise of her is well deserved.

https://newcriterion.com/issues/2023...ve-ancient-war

Susan

It's a wonderful review and is very accurate about "formalists" generally. I found his thoughts on Tufiello, Wilson, and Ishion Hutchinson (a poet I have been reading with fire for many years now) deeply piercing.

Catherine is probably my favorite living poet. She has more poems that bring a surprise tear to your eye in the final line than any I can think of. If you've somehow overlooked Keeping My Name, you should correct that oversight at once. You won't regret it.

I'm among those who lament that she hasn't had a second book, but she has published some stunning poems that I assume will eventually be collected in a book. Some are online. Here are a couple that I think are wonderful:

• Death of a Doorman
  Clear Water

There's also a poem called "Aubade" which is perhaps my favorite of Catherine's, though it appears to have disappeared from the internet and I foolishly didn't preserve my own copy. If anyone out there has a copy, please post it. I honestly don't think poetry gets any better than this poem.

Thanks for this Susan. I read the review and found an interview wth her in Valparaiso review. Sounds like my sort of thing, so I've ordered a copy of her book.

ps. Just seen your post Roger. Thanks for those links.
Just discovered that the Clear Water link doesn't work for ne.

The poem's at Literary Matters, issue 9.3. See if this link works:
https://www.literarymatters.org/1-3-clear-water/

Thanks, Maryann. I fixed the link in my post as well.

What a great poem! I hadn't read it for a while. It gets better and better every time I read it, and it starts out pretty wonderful.

I'm hesitant to agree with William Logan, who is often a gratuitously nasty critic. But apparently we share the view that people who sneer at poems about flowers, pregnancy, and birth are nowhere near as smart as they think they are. And he's right that Catherine has incredible talents in the field of poetry.

Unfortunately for her fans, she also has incredible talents in other areas, and enjoys exercising those. And the world is a better place for it, even if we have to wait for her to find time for poetry again.

Last spring, when I finished reading a novel to my ten-year-old nieces and we still had lots of time left in our Zoom session, I pulled Keeping My Name from the shelf and shared several poems with them. The next weekend, when I asked which novel they wanted me to start, they asked to hear the same poems again. Pretty good recommendation, that.

I know what next book I’ll buy if it’s still available. He doesn’t have snarky things to say about formal poetry. He has snarky things to say about bad formal poetry.

A very sensitive and positive review! Logan never reviewed anything of mine, but he once laughed at a hat I was wearing.

How wonderful to have such a review appear long after a collection appears.

Congrats Catherine and thanks, Susan.

Great to see this! I love Catherine's poetry.