Kenneth Rexroth writes in his foreword: “Critics somehow seem to have ignored the remarkable fact that, at the peaks and turning points of American poetry, at least since the death of Whitman, there has usually stood a woman . . . but few people, even the most passionate feminists, seem to have noticed it.” |
The Pillow Book of Carol Tinker
by Carol Tinker Foreword by Kenneth Rexroth First edition 1980 105 pages, 5½" x 8½" ISBN 0-932274-08-0 Out of Print From the Book
A spectacle of cruelty A stand of cypress burning The eyelid drops on no mans land Hot ashes fall below eye level To form a mold Of what is seen The mold that needs the ear to test it Ringing true A bell like form Studded with rocks that fall like Jewels from their setting As time collapses About the Book The Pillow Book of Carol Tinker is one of the most distinguished poetry collections of this year. She has a very original voice, and this collection is both powerful and moving. — James Laughlin This sure new collection advances Carol Tinker to an even higher place among American poets. — Ann Stanford In Carol Tinker's poems I hear the echoes of the music of Pure Silk Girl. They are complicated, subtle, and rich, touching many chords. — Ling Chung Carol Tinker's poems arise out of an extreme contemplative sensibility that can give and take with the world and the mind and the contents of both. . . . Politically outraged, contemplative, erotic, at times humorous—these are the significant themes we want celebrated again and again. — Doren Robbins THE THIRD RAIL Tinker is a nimble weaver who can assemble . . . image, reference, quotation, narrative fragments and snatches of dialogue into a shimmering yet consistent whole. This process of perception governs both the making of her work and our apprehension of it. — Peter Clothier THE LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK REVIEW My favorite book on Cadmus's outstanding list is The Pillow Book of Carol Tinker, comprising forceful, exact, completely engaging poems by a hugely skilled author previously unknown to me. The book is introduced by Tinker's husband . . . the poet Kenneth Rexroth, whose work, ideas, and personality were crucial to the “San Francisco Renaissance” . . . — Mary Biggs CHOICE, September 1985 |