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A review by nataliealane
How to Read a Poem: And Fall in Love with Poetry by Edward Hirsch
3.0
3/5 stars
I feel like this title is a bit misleading. Rather than bring a guide to reading an experiencing poetry, it’s more of a love letter to an an analysis of poems. I still liked a lot of it. However, the chapters are very dense, making it hard to read. It took me months to read this book because I kept having to put it down for a break. There’s some good information, but it’s bogged down by overly purple prose, and it is unnecessarily verbose. I get wanting to write poetically for a book on poetry, but it was too much. ome of the chapters were on topics that didn’t interest me, and the writing made it harder for me to focus on them and get through those parts. There were also a lot of references to poets and poems that went over my head because I wasn’t familiar with them. While it renewed my interest in poetry and I discovered new poets I like, I wouldn’t necessarily recommend How to Read a Poem to people who are new to poetry. However, I am glad to say I found some modern poetry that I might actually like? The chapter on Post-War Polish Poetry And just the whole Discourse on poetry as a form of social justice was fascinating to me.
I feel like this title is a bit misleading. Rather than bring a guide to reading an experiencing poetry, it’s more of a love letter to an an analysis of poems. I still liked a lot of it. However, the chapters are very dense, making it hard to read. It took me months to read this book because I kept having to put it down for a break. There’s some good information, but it’s bogged down by overly purple prose, and it is unnecessarily verbose. I get wanting to write poetically for a book on poetry, but it was too much. ome of the chapters were on topics that didn’t interest me, and the writing made it harder for me to focus on them and get through those parts. There were also a lot of references to poets and poems that went over my head because I wasn’t familiar with them. While it renewed my interest in poetry and I discovered new poets I like, I wouldn’t necessarily recommend How to Read a Poem to people who are new to poetry. However, I am glad to say I found some modern poetry that I might actually like? The chapter on Post-War Polish Poetry And just the whole Discourse on poetry as a form of social justice was fascinating to me.