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The Making of a Poem: A Norton Anthology of Poetic Forms | 
 enlarge | Creators: Mark Strand, Eavan Boland
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Category: Book
List Price: $18.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:  22 reviews
Sales Rank: 30626
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 448
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.2
Dimensions (in): 9 x 5.5 x 1.2
ISBN: 0393321789
Dewey Decimal Number: 821.008
EAN: 9780393321784
ASIN: 0393321789
Publication Date: April 2001
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Amazon.com Review
The Making of a Poem is among the best how-to-read-poetry titles. Edited by two of our greatest living poets, one Irish and female, the other American and male, it is both an exploration of poetic forms and an anthology. Eavan Boland and Mark Strand each offer an introduction and then give us a series of chapters devoted to particular verse forms--the sonnet, the ballad, the sestina, the villanelle, blank verse, the stanza--as well as a long section devoted to what they somewhat vaguely call shaping forms. This refers to poetic structures established not by a specific rhyme and/or metrical pattern but by content: the elegy, for example, or the pastoral or ode. The book then concludes with a section on open forms. Each chapter is conveniently subdivided, each topic simply defined: a single page gives "The Ballad at a Glance" (or, for that matter, the pantoum) as a quick overview of the form's structure. A page or two on the history of the form follows, along with a brief comment on "the contemporary context." Then a chronological anthology of poems demonstrates the particular form. In the sonnet's case, for instance, we are treated to 23 brilliantly chosen examples--everything from Shakespeare's "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?" to Seamus Heaney's "The Haw Lantern" to Mary Jo Salter's playful "Half a Double Sonnet." The section then concludes with another brief analysis of one example. In this spot, the villanelle features Elizabeth Bishop's classic heartbreaker, "One Art," and blank verse gives us far too brief a take on Robert Frost's tantalizing "Directive." Itself worth the price of admission, the poem begins: Back out of all this now too much for us,
Back in a time made simply by the loss
of detail, burned, dissolved, and broken off
Like graveyard marble sculpture in the weather,
There is a house that is no more than a house
Upon a farm that is no more than a farm
And in a town that is no more than a town.
One can readily see both the advantages and the limitations of such a format: definitions are kept lean, at times approaching the sound bite, and the short sentences and brief paragraphs often seem designed for a readership more accustomed to journalism than to the complexities of Dante (see, for example, the one-page history of the sestina). All of this looks like an attempt to reach an audience of both college students and general readers. While more information might help (brief comments on why certain poems in the anthology are defined as odes, pastorals, or elegies, for example), the bottom line is that The Making of a Poem does an excellent job of taking the inexperienced reader inside the mystery of poetic form. In these terms the volume succeeds, giving us a way into the history of poetry, along with an excellent anthology as a starting point for a deeper exploration of the glories of the genre. --Doug Thorpe
Product Description
Two beloved and esteemed poets have collaborated on this intimate and useful anthology illuminating the history, practice, and wonder of our most elusive art. Intended for all those who love poetry, including teachers, readers, writers, and students, The Making of a Poem will be especially valued by those who feel that an understanding of form—sonnet, ballad, villanelle, sestina, etc.—would enhance their appreciation of poetry, but are daunted by the terms, the names, and the histories of various poetic forms. This anthology draws the reader in, by example and explanation, to the excitement and entertainment of these forms. It explains their origins, traces their development, and shows examples from the past and present. In a feature called "The form at a glance" the reader can try his or her own hand writing a particular form. Included are essays by each of the editors describing their own personal journeys toward a form for their poetic voice. Above all, this anthology shows that poetic form is a continuing adventure. Contemporary poets can be seen here trying out the same forms that poets used hundreds of years ago, but in the new circumstances of a complicated modern world. In this way poetic form is illustrated not as a series of rules, but as a passionate conversation in which every reader of poetry can become involved.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 17 more reviews...
 Plenty of poems-very little instruction April 21, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
If you are looking for teaching on the mechanics of different forms this book is about fives pages from being a door stop. Don't waste your money.
If all you need are examples of the different forms this is your book.
 A Good Intro March 26, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This was a good introduction to poetic forms, giving clear definitions of villanelles, sestinas, sonnets, etc. As a matter of personal choice, I found some of the poems not particularly apt for the poetic form they were trying to define: why was Keats' "Ode on a Grecian Urn" in the "Pastoral" chapter and not the "Ode" chapter? The editors seemed to make arbitrary choices that were sometimes off-kilter. Otherwise, the selection of poems was quite good. As for the complaints about Eurocentrism...let's be honest if not politically correct: nearly all poetic forms in classical poetry were created by Eurocentrist poets. And this book is about classical forms of poetry and how contemporary and modern poets adapted to those forms.
 for high school January 9, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
While objections might be appropriate for high-end poets and advanced university students, I have found this book quite helpful at an introductory high school level. It is short and to the point, and does not overly discourage a young student trying to become acquainted with traditional poetic forms.
Better Books Available July 3, 2006
11 out of 17 found this review helpful
This book is about writing poetry. It is not about the content of a poem, it is about the formal structure. The authors compile descriptions of seven poetic forms (eight, if you count stanza as a form, as the authors inexplicably do) and three thematic categories. Following each description is a long list of examples of the forms, from the point when each form entered English up to... well, up to...
And that's where we run into the first problem with this book. There are good poets out there writing sonnets and sestinas today, but if the authors are to be believed, formal poetry came to a juddering halt when Robert Frost died. As a reader of poetry, I like Dylan Thomas, Robert Browning, and William Shakespeare, but if a student learning poetry uses this book as the yardstick of where these forms are right now, that student will at best be over forty years out of date.
That's not to suggest that the selections of poems in this book aren't good. They are. Not only do the compilers select the best poets of days gone by, but they select the best examples of the work of those poets. But the selection is slanted in favor of the past. To be really useful a book needs to include both a historical overview of a form and a synoptic look at where poetry lives right now.
Likewise, the selection of forms is brief. I like villanelles and ballads as much as the next guy, but would it really break the editors to dedicate a little more space to ghazals, cinquains, triolets, and haiku? The selection of forms in this book is very introductory, limited to the forms the editors could find in English in profusion. Perhaps somebody fairly new to poetry, who hasn't learned what the forms are and how they work, will find this collection useful. But a poet eager to make the leap beyond mere beginner status will be frustrated with this book.
This book isn't bad. What it does focus on, it focuses on in depth and fairly globally (as much as limiting the selection to English can be global). For beginners, this book may well be a handy introduction to versification. But for those who have been writing for a while, and those who want to move beyond the beginning, there are better books available. Consider, for instance, Miller Williams' Patterns of Poetry: An Encyclopedia of Forms or Barbara Drake's Writing Poetry. Take your time to comparison-shop, ask more experienced poets, and just read. Because you will find books that suit your needs far better than this one.
Thumbs Down April 15, 2006
5 out of 13 found this review helpful
The examples are archaic, the introductory material weak, the discussion of how to write cursory.
Save your money for STRONG MEASURES by Dacey and Jauss, a much more expensive book, but worth it many times over.
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