As a poet who is a teacher of philosophy, John Koethe knows better than most of us the uses and dissatisfactions of both disciplines, if indeed they are disciplines. In this ravishing and haunted book he comes face to face with the time when 'more than half my life is gone,' and must try to find the meaning of 'a childish/dream of love, and then the loss of love,/and all the intricate years between.' As funny and fresh as it is tragic and undeceived, Falling Water ranks with Wallace Stevens' Auroras of Autumn as one of the profoundest meditations on existence ever formulated by an American Poet." --John Ashbery "To describe with unpromising candor the inner life of a man adrift in the waning of the 20th century is one thing, but to do it without a shred of self-pity is another. The poems of his new book, Falling Water, are like no one else's. In them, even the most extreme exertions of consciousness are transformed into the luminous measures of beautiful speech." --Mark Strand "In this ambitious volume, the magnificent poet who gave us The Late Wisconsin Spring moves ever more swiftly and surefootedly into the deepest regions of self-invention: the past -- few poets write more accurately and painfully about that uncanny estranged place that never finds its way out of us; the present, or idea of the present, as mere projection, and yet a projection so poignantly, materially, tenderly touched it gleams with all its claustrophobic distances; and the future...'I wish that time could bring the future back again/And let me see things as they used to seem to me/Before I found myself alone, in an emancipated state--/Alone and free and filled...' With its low-key blank verse, its apparently casual manner of speech, its digressions, asides, recollections -- with all its taking its time -- this is a poetry of magnificent undertow, all proximity of thought, singularity of contemplation, protest, pretext, reflection -- all disenchantment and then, suddenly, blazing re-enchantment, with the newly, lovingly, seen-through real." --Jorie Graham
John Koethe's The Constructor is a scrupulous, elegant account of the meditative intellect as an instrument continually registering the passage of time. Exquisitely modulated and brutally honest, these poems would be harrowing were they not so seductively beautiful. No one writing in this country today sees as deeply as Koethe into the tears that lie at the heart of things, and no contemporary investigation of the life of the mind may be called complete that does not accommodate the lush intricacy of his terrifying recognitions." -- George Bradley "I prize John Koethe's intimate expanses and unsettling reveries, his tender contemplations and odd mental landscapes. He is an heir to Wallace Stevens and John Ashbery and, like them, he gives us the sensation of thinking itself, of a certain fleeting, daily, solitary consciousness rescued from oblivion and held aloft." -- Edward Hirsch
A searching new collection from America’s philosopher-poet John Koethe, in his tenth volume of poetry, investigates the capricious nature of everyday life, “the late-night jazz, great sex and all / The human shit defining what we are.” His poems—always dynamic and in process, never static or complete—luxuriate in the questions that punctuate the most humdrum of routines, rendering a robust portrait of an individual: complicated, quotidian, and resounding with truth. The Swimmer argues that this “energizes everything”: life’s trivialities, surprises, and disappointments, and the “terrible feeling of being just about to fall.”
North Point North: New and Selected Poems showcases the work of an important contemporary American poet, winner of the prestigious Kingsley-Tufts Award for Poetry. The volume opens with twenty-one new poems, some of which have appeared in The New Yorker, American Poetry Review, the New Republic, the Paris Review, and the Kenyon Review, among other periodicals, and in The Best American Poems 2001, edited by Robert Hass and David Lehman. Following are selections from Koethe's five earlier collections of poems: Blue Vents, Domes, The Late Wisconsin Spring, The Constructor, and Falling Water. Together these poems create a remarkable and powerful new volume, a milestone in this gifted poet's career.
Let me stay there for a while, while evening Gathers in the sky and daylight lingers on the hills. There's something in the air, something I can't quite see, Hiding behind this stock of images, this language Culled from all the poems I've ever loved. John Koethe's remarkable gift to readers is an elegiac poetry that explores the transitory nature of ordinary human experience. The beautiful poems in this new collection celebrate the creative power of human beings, the only weapon we possess against time's relentless "slow approach to anonymity and death." Of all Koethe's books, SALLY'S HAIR is probably his most human and various. He is well known for his meditative lyrics and this volume begins with a brilliant series of such poems, among them "Eros and the Everyday." This is followed by "The Unlasting," a long poem devoted to time and experience, and a third section comprised of more public poems, some of them political, such as "The Maquiladoras" and "Poetry and the War." This perceptive, luminescent collection concludes with a group of vivid and conversational poems, recollections, including the gems "Proust" and "HAMLET.
[Koethe's] new collection is that rarity, a book of poems with a genuine philosophical dimension and an elegant but conversational poise."--The New York Times Book Review "Solemn and playful, John Koethe's poems lock themselves gradually but firmly into one's memory. His new collection offers in his own words, 'happiness, for myself and strangers.'"--John Ashbery Originally published in 1984. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.
A searching new collection from America’s philosopher-poet John Koethe, in his tenth volume of poetry, investigates the capricious nature of everyday life, “the late-night jazz, great sex and all / The human shit defining what we are.” His poems—always dynamic and in process, never static or complete—luxuriate in the questions that punctuate the most humdrum of routines, rendering a robust portrait of an individual: complicated, quotidian, and resounding with truth. The Swimmer argues that this “energizes everything”: life’s trivialities, surprises, and disappointments, and the “terrible feeling of being just about to fall.”
Addressing objective and subjective views of the self and the world in philosophy and poetry, this collection brings together a chronology of John Koethe's thoughts on the connections between the two forms and makes a significant contribution to unsettling the oppositions that separate them. The essays traverse the philosophical conception of the self in modern poetry and locate connections between poets including William Wordsworth, Wallace Stevens, and John Ashbery alongside philosophers including Kant, Schopenhauer, and Wittgenstein. Koethe pays special attention to romantic poetry and notions of the sublime, which he maps onto subjective individual experience and the objective perspective on the natural world. Koethe further explores this theme in a new essay on romanticism and the sublime in relation to the mind-body problem. Using an associative and impressionistic style to write philosophically about poetry, Koethe defends his own approach that such writing cannot and should not aim for the rigor of philosophical argumentation.
Ludwig Wittgenstein's philosophical work is informed throughout by a particular broad theme: that the semantic and mentalistic attributes of language and human life are shown by verbal and nonverbal conduct, but that they resist incorporation into the domain of the straightforwardly factual. So argues John Koethe, in contrast to the standard view that Wittgenstein's earlier and later philosophical positions are sharply opposed.According to the received view, Wittgenstein's thinking underwent a radical transformation after the Tractatus, leading him to abandon classical realism and to develop an alternative semantics based on the notion of warranted assertability. Koethe maintains that the thesis that semantic claims are not made true by any facts whatsoever, which was a central part of Wittgenstein's early theory of elementary propositions, was one he continued to develop in his later writings, and that it is perfectly compatible with classical realism. In making his case for the essential continuity of Wittgenstein's thought, Koethe ranges over the entire corpus of the philosopher's writing, and concludes by pointing out connections between Wittgenstein's views and those of several contemporary philosophers, including Nagel, Dennett, Davidson, and Dummett.
Collected poems from America’s searching and thoughtful philosopher-poet . . . There’s something Comforting about rituals renewed, even adolescents’ pipe dreams: They’ll find out soon enough, and meanwhile find their places In the eternal scenery, less auguries or cautionary tales Than parts of an unchanging whole, as ripe for contemplation As a planisphere or the clouds: the vexed destinies, the shared life, The sempiternal spectacle of someone preaching to the choir While walking backwards in the moment on a warm spring afternoon. John Koethe’s poems—always dynamic and in process, never static or complete—luxuriate in the questions that punctuate the most humdrum of routines, rendering a robust portrait of an individual: complicated, quotidian, and resounding with truth. Gathering for the first time his impressive and award-winning body of work, published between 1966 and 2016, Walking Backwards introduces this gifted poet to a new, wider readership.
This third edition of Drugs, the Brain, and Behavior provides a comprehensive overview of the brain and explores the clinical and pharmacological issues surrounding drug abuse and dependence. Dr Brick provides definitions, historic discoveries about the nervous system, and original, eye-catching illustrations to discuss the brain/behavior relationship, basic neuroanatomy, neurophysiology, and the mechanistic actions of mood-altering drugs. Topics include: how psychoactive drugs affect cognition, behavior, and emotion; the brain/behavior relationship; the specific effects of major addictive and psychoactive drug groups; new definitions and thinking about abuse and dependence; and the medical uses of drugs, such as cannabinoids. A new chapter on biobehavioral markers explores how markers can guide the clinician in the diagnosis of some disorders. This book offers a quick reference guide which uses a balance of instruction, illustrations, tables, and formulas, that will give you a broad, lasting introduction to this intriguing subject. Drugs, the Brain, and Behavior is an invaluable resource for students in the field, nurses, psychologists, counsellors, physicians and other health care professionals.
A collection of essays, written for this volume by leaders in the field, that study the emotional and cognitive significance of narrative and its implications for aesthetics and the philosophy of art"--Provided by publisher.
For the sake of contraption (like Frost) and of character (like Robinson), John Burt will do a great deal, and his scope and scansion require a great deal, for his theme is nothing less than the reinvention of heroism (King Mark, Mary of Nazareth, St. Francis, Paolo and Francesca, Ariadne) and the invention of a new heroics (Woodrow Wilson, Willard Gibbs). As attentive to ekphrasis as to the sonnet's narrow room, Burt feels what he knows, and he knows that we can learn from the past only by repeating it. A grand achievement!"--Richard Howard. Almost all these poems are narrative, telling stories that turn on some small but crucial shift of sensibility. One hears in them a speaking rather than a singing voice, a voice which, for all its formality and gravity, remains oral and sociable, a voice which tells things rather than spins charms. Their predominant mood is lucid asperity, sometimes breaking out into the angry Calvinism they always barely keep down, sometimes striving to achieve a humane skepticism that always just eludes them. The book consists of two sections, one concerned with the cruxes and contradictions of private feeling, the other with the unraveling of the public world. Each section centers on a long narrative poem that culminates the building tensions of the poems that precede it and makes possible the resolutions that follow them. Sonnet I from "St. Francis and the Wolf" Saved at last, not at the last of me, I knelt two-legged, made of guttural air A little yelp to sound like human prayer. The saints were cautious, understandably. I took the cup, and managed not to drool, But dreamed the wine was blood, as I'd been taught, And vainly curbed the vain bent of my thought. I knew myself an angel, felt a fool. Could God have erred in making teeth and maw? Then for his glory I will bite the lamb Whose terror he transmogrifies to awe That I may do his service as I am, Till as I am I leap the mortal gulf To rage in heaven, a perfected wolf. Originally published in 1988. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.
Finely written and meticulously documented, this book describes how--very early on--a small group of ordinary citizens began extraordinary efforts to demonstrate that the JFK assassination could not have happened the way the government said it did. In time, their efforts had an enormous impact on public opinion, but this account concentrates on the months before the controversy caught fire, when people with skeptical viewpoints still saw themselves as lone voices. Material seldom seen by the public includes a suppressed photograph of the grassy knoll, an unpublished 1964 interview with an eyewitness, the earliest mention of the "magic bullet," and an analysis of the commotion surrounding New Orleans district attorney Jim Garrison's charge that anti-Castro CIA operatives were involved.
States of Health identifies the practical relevance of federalism in the United States to people facing ethical decisions about health and health care, and it considers the theoretical justifications for permissible differences among states. It asks whether authority over important aspects of health is misaligned in the United States today, with some matters problematically left to the states while others are taken over by the federal government.
A colorful combination of storytelling, poets, poetry, and railways presented using America's fifty states as a backdrop. 3 men who travel the U.S.A. in the year of 2012... To write a written documentary on Poets and the Railroad in our times... When they sleep they get taken back in time to the 19th Century, when the roads were built, and they have such great experiences, and meet key Poets, and figures... Upon waking they have conversations about Poets from the 20th Century, and RxR events... Then it goes into their written documentary on Poetry and Poets now... Main Characters that Andy and Red and Train Marshal Charlie journey within their Dreams, and they are Alphonso G. Newcomer, Mad Bear, Jung Hem Sing, Mr. Welchberry, Patrick O'Hara, Jimmy New Orleans, and many more
The Passionate Spectator collects essays, reviews, and art criticism by John Yau, an internationally lauded poet, critic, and curator. In this wide-ranging collection, Yau explores the intersection of art and poetry, dissolving boundaries between the artistic traditions and reimagining what it means to see and to write. Whether he is interpreting the poetic use of titles in Jessica Stockholder’s paintings, reviewing the collaborative book project between American poet Robert Creeley and German artist Georg Baselitz, or considering the significance of Frank O’Hara’s decision to have his portrait drawn wearing nothing but army boots, Yau is consistently daring, original, and contemporary. Yau’s diverse critical sensibilities permeate The Passionate Spectator as he moves seamlessly between the visual and literary arts. Highlights of this collection include an essay on the poet as art critic, a study of the relationship between Kevin Young’s poetry and the paintings of Jean-Michel Basquiat, and an imaginative piece in which Yau speculates about what Jorge Luis Borges would have created had he been a visual artist. In the title essay, Yau lays out the duty of the spectator—a duty shared by viewer, reader, critic, and artist: “it is up to us to experience art, to engage and believe in its power.” .
The critical century between the arrival of Constantine and the advance of Alaric in the early fifth century witnessed dramatic changes in the city of Rome. In this book Dr Curran has broken away from the usual notions of religious conflict between Christians and pagans, to focus on a number of approaches to the Christianization of Rome. He surveys the laws and political considerations which governed the building policy of Constantine and his successors, the effect of papal building and commemorative constructions on Roman topography, the continuing ambivalence of the Roman festal calendar, and the conflict between Christians over asceticism and 'real' Christianity. Thus using analytical, literary, and legal evidence Dr Curran explains the way in which the landscape, civic life, and moral values of Rome were transformed by complex and sometimes paradoxical forces, laying the foundation for the capital of medieval Christendom. Through a study of Rome as a city Dr Curran explores the rise of Christianity and the decline of paganism in the later Roman empire.
Hope, trust, and forgiveness have the potential to enrich and empower human lives. Each is a facet of a life well lived, but each also possesses significant challenges from complex personal, interpersonal, and institutional forces. In Hope, Trust, and Forgiveness, John T. Lysaker draws our attention to the ways in which hope, trust, and forgiveness are capacities that intimately contend with the finitude of ethical life. Hope, Trust, and Forgiveness explores the contentions of each at length, clarifying those challenges and empowering us to meet them. In doing so, Lysaker grapples with the question of how a philosophical essay can offer ethical insight. He answers with an experimental, improvisational moral perfectionism that refuses the lure of universalized moral claims as well as the parochialism of conventional accounts of ethical life"--
The killing of US President John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas, in November 1963, sent a shockwave around the world. The charismatic young Democrat was seen as a beacon of hope in the West, but his liberal reforming policies had made him many powerful enemies at home. For sixty years, numerous theories have swirled around this key event in American - and world - history. Yet whatever the conclusions of the official Warren Report - that the President had been assassinated by a lone gunman, Lee Harvey Oswald - many people doubt that to be true. Indeed, President Nixon later admitted on tape that the report was 'a hoax committed on the American people.' John Hughes-Wilson, a former colonel in British Intelligence, has sifted through the millions of words and thousands of pieces of evidence, to put together an intelligence assessment of what really happened that dreadful high noon in Dallas in 1963.John Hughes-Wilson highlights the facts behind why Marilyn Monroe had to be silenced, LBJ's corrupt secrets, the Kennedys' secret Cuban coup plans, how the Mafia manipulated politicians and the CIA, and how the assassination was covered up. Reading this astounding book, no one can be in any doubt that JFK's death was not at the hands of a lone deranged gunman, but a deadly plot to remove a President who threatened vested interests at home and abroad.
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