The heralded debut collection of poems by the author of What the Living Do (Norton, 1997). Selected by Margaret Atwood as a winner in the 1987 Open Competition of the National Poetry Series, this unique collection was the first sounding of a deeply authentic voice. Howe's early writings concern relationship, attachment, and loss, in a highly original search for personal transcendence. Many of the thirty-four poems in The Good Thief appeared in such prestigious journals and periodicals as The Atlantic, The American Poetry Review, Poetry, Ploughshares, The Agni Review, and The Partisan Review. Howe's first collection, chosen by Margaret Atwood for the "National Poetry" series, employs a somewhat simplistic, imprecise, yet fashionable surrealism: there are strange noises in the night, birds appear as omens, dead people converse. Premonitions of doom abound, but nothing is ever told fully: "If the man has died, if the child's illness has taken a sudden/turn, if the house has burned in the middle of night/ and in winter, there is at least a kind of stopping that will/pass for peace." But we never see the house burn, feel the winter's cold, or understand the peace. In the best poems (e.g., "Encounter," "The Beast") Howe hints at large emotional issues that, if explored more fully, might produce some powerful poetry. Rochelle Ratner, formerly Poetry Editor, "Soho Weekly News," New York Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. Apology Bad Weather The Beast Death, The Last Visit Encounter From Nowhere The Good Reason For Our Forgetting Gretel, From A Sudden Clearing Grosvenor Road Guests How Many Times Isaac Keeping Still Letter To My Sister Lullaby Mary's Argument The Meadow Menses The Mountain My Father's Oak Part Of Eve's Discussion Providing For Each Other Recovery Retribution Song Of The Spinster Sorrow The Split A Thin Smattering Of Applause The Unforgiven Veteran's Day What Belongs To Us What The Angels Left The Wise Men Without Devotion -- Table of Poems from Poem Finder® Howe's haunting lyricism lifts the back shades on the familial and the mythic in poems that bespeak a hard-earned compassion amid the world's chaffing. -- The Boston Phoenix Marie Howe's poetry doesn't fool around . . . . [The poems] transcend their own dark roots. -- Margaret Atwood [Howe] has stolen from domesticity not only the trappings of mysticism but the wisdom of experience. -- The Partisan Review Marie Howe is the former poet laureate of New York and the author of three previous collections. Magdalene was longlisted for the National Book Award. Howe teaches at Sarah Lawrence College and lives in New York City. Used Book in Good Condition