WOMAN DRINKING ABSINTHE Analyzed by Billy Mills
Former Guardian Literary Journalist, Billy Mills, analyzes the conception of love in Katherine E. Young's new collection.
"Young’s core subject is love, but there’s nothing redemptive or particularly healing about its manifestations," writes Billy Mills in his analysis of Young's Woman Drinking Absinthe. Elsewhere he compares the different manifestations of this theme to coeval poets Christopher Jane Corkery and James Roome.
Mills analysis is fitting for Young's work which comes from a deeply literary place and is steeped in evocative allusion. Mills places WDA alongside the likes of Pound and Eliot in his thinking. Like these poets, Young uses unorthodox and historically informed forms and diction in her poetry.
An excerpt of Mills' analysis follows:
"The fourth (of five) sections of Katherine E. Young’s Woman Drinking Absinthe is a single sequence, ‘Place of Peace’ that takes off from a visit to the Civil War memorial at Shiloh National Military Park. The fourth section of the sequence opens with he line ‘Who doesn’t desire to be mesmerized by love?’ and ends ‘once more I fear the shadow of his hand.’ These lines could be said to serve as the twin poles of the entire collection.
For Young’s core subject is love, but there’s nothing redemptive or particularly healing about its manifestations."
The poems in Katherine E. Young’s Woman Drinking Absinthe concern themselves with transgressions. Lust, betrayal, guilt, redemption: Young employs fairy tales, opera, Impressionism, Japonisme, Euclidean geometry, Greek tragedy, wine, figs, and a little black magic to weave a tapestry that’s as old as the hills and as fresh as today’s headlines.
What Does Anne Lamott Think of “Navigating the Divide”?
What does bestselling author Anne Lamott think of Linda Watanabe McFerrin’s “Navigating the Divide”?
Elizabeth Hazen’s New Poem, “Monarch”, Published by Shenandoah Magazine
A new Elizabeth Hazen poem, “Monarch”, has been published by the prestigious Shenandoah Magazine.
Independent Bookstore Day: What do the Indies Offer?
“Amid Amazon’s economic hegemony, amid the wholesale abandonment of big-box stores around the country, amid the strange, unpredicted resurgence of vinyl record collecting, and amid the general economic turmoil in the American printed news media we have, sitting in the room-corner upon a large leather chair, drinking tea, nose nestled cozily in the pages of Du Bois, the indie bookstore question. For what purpose does an indie bookstore exist in the age of digital media and online book sales?”