William Carlos Williams Books

My readings of Castaneda's work have always been fairly literal and I've felt I've missed the point. "Border Crossings" has helped to crystalize my understanding of don Juan's teachings and how they relate to the unconscious. Williams incorporates elements of Jungian psychology, mythology, and comparative religion to portray Castaneda's experiences in a more metaphorical light, exposing the unconscious as an agent operating to tune our conscious selves.

I consider myself a student of my own unconscious, but not an authority on shamanism or psychology. It's a challenging read and I've benefited greatly from the insights of a process therapist who integrates Jungian and Toltec concepts into his practice. I recommend "Border Crossings" to anyone in the midst of serious self-examination, especially those with a fondness for Castaneda's books.

If you enjoy "Border Crossings," I also recommend books by Dr. Arnold Mindell, another Jungian analyst adept at putting a psychological spin on shamanism and related metaphysical practices.

This book brilliantly covers the work of the spanish architect Carlos Ferrater. A mediterranean international neo-modernist whos architecture best can be described as poetic rationalism expressed in clean-cut forms sharp details and a richness of fine details. This book is an overall pleasure to read including both text, drawing material and the many beautiful pictures it consist of.

For those who enjoy the subtlety of William Carlos Williams’s poetry this book is a great compilation of his later poetic works. Although these are not his most well known works, there are some very beautiful poems included here. Many of these poems are more experimental, and seem to me to often be tinged with a darker mood than his earlier writings. In particular, the poets ability to describe everyday objects in simple yet elegant verse, and to find new meaning in such objects, is unique and refreshing. The Collected Later Poems of William Carlos Williams, however, is probably not a very good introduction to his poetic style. Many of his greatest poems are not included here and this compilation is rather mixed; containing both some really great poems and some of lesser quality. If you are new to the poetry of William Carlos Williams I would advise you to buy any of the more complete compilations that are avalible.

This poem stands out as one of my favorite.

The Term

A rumpled sheet
Of brown paper
About the length

And apparent bulk
Of a man was
Rolling with the

Wind slowly over
And over in
The street as

A car drove down
Upon it and
Crushed it to

The ground. Unlike
A man it rose
Again rolling

With the wind over
And over to be as
It was before.

The focus of this excellent wildflower guide to flowers found in the Smokies is to tell WHERE and WHEN to find them in bloom. The book relies upon color plates for ID and is limited enough (only 144 pages) to allow a quick scan of all the photos when searching to ID that elusive flower. Although not nearly so complete as THE AUDUBON GUIDE TO EASTERN WILDFLOWERS (my overall favorite), this book has become my LOCAL favorite for use during outings in the Smokies.

Wildflower enthusiasts of all types should have this book in their pocket when hiking in the Smokies. It will save you time because it focuses only on about 225 flowers found in the Smokies. If you've located in the book one or two types of flowers in bloom in the area where you are hiking then you'll be within 5 or 6 pages of the correct location for all the other flowers in bloom at that particular time!

Other nice features of the book include the ring binding which allows it to open easily, the manner in which all color plates are on the right side so as to allow thumbing thru in search of the correct plate and the excellent close-up color photos of the flowers.

My primary complaint is that the book doesn't offer photos of MORE species of flowers--hey there are over 1,500 species in the Smokies--but this book is rarely a disppointment for me, an avid wildflower enthusiast who spends at least one or two days/week hiking in the Smokies during warm weather months.

Man's Story 2 offers up a bunch of stories and art about sexy vampire girls, and the result is a fun read. As I mentioned in my review of Androids 2, I'm a fan of C. C. Blake, and another one of his stories appears here. In "Cave and the Vamp", Blake's tough guy hero Chuck Cave gets involved with a gal whose sister has been kidnapped by a self styled vampire hunter. Is the gal really a vampire or is the guy totally nuts? And there's more stories, too! Overall, a fun read worth the $9.95 price tag.

This book is very, very good for Step I. It is concise and to the point... This book should always be in-stock. I highly recommend it for review only. Use it AFTER you have studied micro well. It will definitely help you pass Step I.

My point of view: I have a PhD in American Lit, but do not currently work in academia. I write from the perspective of an educated enthusiast.

I have not read any other book of his selected essays, yet I am bold enough to suggest one start with this collection. WCW was a rather philosophical poet, and knowing what he thought helps one to understand his poetry. These essays, which span decades and come from a number of publications (as well as some unpublished), allow the reader to see his various perspectives on politics, history, music and poetry. This is an excellent starting point for anyone wishing to engage WCW at something above the college sophomore level.

THE SPANISH AMERICAN ROOTS has me wondering why it isn't more satisfying and persuasive, since its author, Julio Marzan, has wonderful excitement and knows his Williams like the back of his hand, always pulling out the exact right referent with which to back his argumentation. Every page has another fine quotation and an equally fine application, and one couldn't be more sympathetic to the author's cause, which makes perfect sense the more one thinks about it.

Yet how does Williams' Spanish heritage manifest itself in his poetry? There Marzan has an uphill struggle on his hands. Emotionally it makes sense, since a lot of WCW's writing seems to operate on a double matrix, there's an Anglo rectitude Marzan identifies with WCW's father, "William George," and there's an extra element, something the skews the poetry into a previously unknown (in American poetry) range of modernism and Marzan pins this as the Puerto Rican strain, for Williams' mother was born and reared in Mayaguez. What makes it difficult for Marzan is that Williams only rarely acknowledges anything Spanish and when he does, it's almost always with that distant reach of the "other." "Those people." Himself as a "Gringo." It's hard to follow all of Marzan's arguments, mainly because one doesn't always want to go where he wants to go, i.e., tracking down all references to the "jungle" or the "fertile" or the "dark side" (the duende) in Williams' work and invariably he sees all these strains as the Spanish at work in WCW and it all starts to seem, if not reductive, then a bit retardataire, like saying Rita Hayworth was an appealing dancer because she was Mexican. In fact all the worst aspects of Williams, especially his sexual politics, become Puerto Rican in Marzan's reading and I don't know if he realizes how compromised his Latin American WCW becomes. No, I'm wrong there; he does appreciate how much his reading complicates our previously beneficent image of Williams, but again, the evidence is scant enough to make you think, maybe, maybe not.

He says this is not a biography but rather a book that will aid the biographer of the future. May that writer come along who can shed light on Marzan's tantalizing hints. He's got the sizzle, but where's the steak?

These are two charming eclectic collections of love poetry, on CD with accompanying books, which really ought to be purchased and reviewed together. The 10 actors, all talented, also present a varied lot. Each poem and each performance was enjoyable, some romantic, some funny, some thoughtful, some sad, ranging from modern to one written in the 3rd Century and all in between. Many of the poems were a surprise and the very fact of their inclusion was enchanting, for instance Simon Prebble's charming rendition of The Owl and the Pussycat, a poem whose acquaintance I made 50 years ago and which remains dear to me, on the Voices of Marriage CD. I reacted differently to each poem, to each actor, and to each performance and would assume that most listeners would also have highly personal reactions. There were many poems I was especially delighted to hear, as they were old favorites, others because they were newly met ones. There were two actors I found irresistible, whose every performance was wonderful: Simon Prebble, long a favorite, and Michael Wager, new to me. Most of the others were also superb. There were some who were decidedly less entrancing, however each actor did at least one poem no one else could have done better and every poem can be enjoyed as it was performed, on its own merits. The more I listen, the more I find to enjoy, even including the order in which the poems are presented. In all, this is a wonderful idea.

If your a fan of the great poet or unfamiliar this is an excellent work. Contains not only his poetry, but a fine selection of prose. I highly reccomend this book .