Pitt Books

Doubiago does an excellent job at bringing the macrocosm of feminism vs. patriarchy into the microcosm of a mother/daughter relationship, in the setting of a trip to South America. The book is actually a long, narrative poem in and of itself, superbly sustained throughout with deep, emotional images. Well worth the read any day! I have actually written my Masters thesis on this book.

The poem covers a journey of the poet with her daughter from North to South America. As they travel, the poet attempts to come to terms with her relation to her past, her daughter, and to men. She does so with fresh and striking language, and an unevasive honesty which does not fool itself with the poses of so much contemporary poetry. Doubiago does not write about how people are supposed to feel; she writes about how they do feel, in real and human situations. I highly recommend it.

Ms. Greenberg's characters are wonderfully complex and realistic and their situations simultaneously sad and funny. The sense of humor through which she views her characters softens the often gut-wrenching details in these stories. I would like to see a novel from Ms. Greenberg next!

You need this book to get a giggle out of the society that we live in. Read it while you are waiting for your flight to board or even in your shrink's waiting room. The people in the stories are all people you know or have met and the cover looks good with whatever you are wearing.

- Cosmic Larry

as if we could walk beyond mistrust, loss, regret,
as if, pursuing our true destination, we didn't trail
this residue of the past behind us, part of that cycle
inescapable in this earthly life, that primordial cycle.
~Ronald Wallace

Ronald Wallace captures moments in exquisite detail as he weaves humor, loss, new discoveries, remembrance and ironic revelations into lyrical tapestries of vibrant words.

At times he concludes a poem with bittersweet poignancy or leaves you with a line that begs for further contemplation. Wallace finely crafts stories of tragedy, emotional complexity or unleashes innocence where we would expect to find darkness. There is bravery in surprising feelings where sheer honesty awakens our awareness of survival skills or essential human desires.

Simplicity becomes profound as he discovers eggs in a nest. The playful banter of cats in "Earthly Pleasure" is described with such wit and left me laughing as I remembered each time we have adopted a new kitten.

Ronald Wallace's recollections of his daughter usually leave me highly amused and "The Failures of Pacifism" was no exception. What stunned me was my reaction to "Canzone: Egrets." It was as if this poem was a key to a dark room inside my heart filled with unspoken thoughts and buried contemplations. It was as if the poem allowed me to unburden my mind and I felt free of thoughts that had been swirling in my subconscious mind for years. They raced out of me in tears.

When Ronald Wallace describes his father's toolbox, I could not help thinking how his toolbox only differs in material form. He carefully crafts poetry as only a wordsmith could, perfecting a vivid statement or softly sanding a sentence into perfect persuasion.

Could we somehow become the world's great key
unlocking the past like a fortress of snow
and find inside what we need to help us believe
in this sonorous weather, this improbably heat,
this uplifting salt of the sea.
~Canzone: Siesta Key

Time's Fancy is brimming with poems you can revisit time and time again. These are poems to heal, surprise and nurture. They radiate with a rare clarity and sensitive warmth I've rarely seen in daily observance. The delicious descriptions in "Sweet Corn," the sensual beauty in "Dragonflies," and the memories of Ronald's father make this book of poems a journey of the heart.

If you love poems with "orange" themes, you might also want to look for Long For This World by Ronald Wallace. After reading his poems about oranges, I had to go buy some essential oil of orange and eating an orange is now an entirely different experience. Ronald Wallace awakens your awareness of simple pleasures and suddenly life becomes a poem.

~The Rebecca Review

This is an excellent book of poetry, one of Wallace's finer works. Wallace is a native of Wisconsin, and in being so, includes many images of the rural Wisconsin lifestyle which folks from the area will especially appreciate. His use of imagery in his prose appeals to so many of the senses. Things we experience in everyday life go from mundane to extraordinary with his usage of extended metaphors. Particular favorites include the following poems "Astronomy of Loss", "Beethoven and the Birds", "Dragonflies", "Quick Bright Things", "Possum, 1942".

This book is a real eye opener for the Jamaica tourist who cares at all about Jamaica. The history of tourism described in this book has many, many parallels to modern Jamaican tourism (white tourists were complaining about hustlers in the 1800s...prostitutes popped up almost immediately upon tourism's start).

However, it sometimes has the feel of a dissertation, and can be a bit dry at times. I also wished it had gone a little further with modern tourism and spent a little less time with the beginnings.

Overall, for the "Jamaicaholic", this is well worth reading.

Very good. There should be more books written like this. People need to see the real effects of mass tourism. They really need to understand that their tourism dollars DO NOT "trickle down" to the poor people in countries like Jamaica. If you do go to Jamaica, do the right thing, stay out of the all-inclusives, go green, go to small "ma and pa" style accomodations, help the Jamaican people get out of the debt and extreme poverty that the World Trade Organization and the USA have forced them into.

This electric 34-page picture book makes language into music. Written in 1980, the story is set in about the 1930s, in the rural South.

A young boy's mother washed clothes and his father was busy unloading feed for the chickens. "The sun rose aflame. It quickly dried the dew and baked the town. Another hot, humdrum day."

Ty asked his brother to join him in a walk to the pond. When Jason declined, Ty went alone. He took in the big trees, which sank their roots deep and lifted the branches up, up, up toward the sky. Then he heard a step-th-hump, step-th-hump, step-th-hump, and compared the mystery sound to the churr-rrr-rrr of raccoon babies and the purr-rrr of kittens.

It came from a man carrying a bundle, a man with one leg and a leg made of a wooden peg. The man sat down by the pond and washed himself, unwrapped his bundle and ate apples, cheese and bread. After washing his dishes, he began to juggle them. His juggling made music, which the language creates: tink-ki-tink-ki-ki-tink-ki-tink. And so on, for a whole page.

Ty watched from the grass. Then came a rumble like thunder in the distance--a train. Woo-woo-woo-ee-ee-eee. Ty forgot the man as he listened to the clackety-clack of and the train whistle as the wheels died away. The man he had been watching leapt out of the grass and laughed, introduced himself as Andro, a one-man band. He asked Ty to borrow a washboard, two wooden spoons, a tin pail and a comb.

Ty returned home and stunned his brother, sister, father and mother with the story of the one-legged man, but borrowed everything he needed by sundown. The next 12 pages of the book bcome a veritable concert.

There are many lessons in this book. The primary one is how little one needs for happiness. The second is that language itself can be music.

Children love it. Alyssa A. Lappen

I am an elementary education student and I have to read 25 childrens' literature books. I decided on this book by just randomly choosing this book. I like this book a lot! I like the fact that the man with the story took something ordinary and made it extraordinary. Using everyday items to make music just goes to show you that it's not what you have but how you use what you have.

I got sent an issue with the wrong cover - Pitt is on it, Tutu not. Other than that the magazine is very interesting and has a lot of informing articles on Africa in it.

I have spent years of my life reading and watching news about Africa, and it never matched what I experienced being on site. This issue of Vanity Fair portrays it ALL: the Good, the Bad, The Ugly, the Amazing and the Truth. For a fashion addict that I am, I never bought an issue of Vanity Fair and that day in the Hudson News store, the "Africa" logo caught my attention. When I opened the magazine, this is what got me to buy it, I read the following lines: "The media often treat Africa's 53 countries as a vast hopeless mass. `That hurts' writes one of Kenya literary stars who has a deeply individual tale of his country stunning political change and the emergence of the "Equity Generation"".
A fundamental statement is made in that sentence: it's not Africa, it's about 53 Africans countries, with different cultures, different stories, different lives, different histories...
This issue depicts Africa in its True Light and opens doors to:
- the world to appreciate, to explore, to connect, to respect, to help Africa
- Africans to embrace their homeland and fight for it
Every article is worth reading and gives hope to true journalism. I will buy more of this issue I started to do, to offer to my loves ones. I should thank Vanity Fair, the editor and guest editor.

This is the first book of poetry by J. E. Pitts, the Poetry Editor of The Oxford American and co-editor of the experimental literary journal VOX. Early reviewers have already said this is the best first book of poetry they have read in quite some time.

"The Weather of Dreams" offers appreciative readers the debut compilation of the free verse poetry of writer and visual artist J. E. Pitts. An accomplished wordsmith with an ear for the rhythmic cadence of words, Pitts' poetry is especially recommended to those who appreciate the hard work that goes into (and is essential for) the intelligible written word. 'In The Field': the orb, that summer sun,/swings over us like a/sickle shaving young wheat./Bringing out the rows,/going down the line,/coming back to double-check./Snapping and pulling,/checking for spots,/taking the good,/the manageable,/leaving the seconds and the poor./Filling the baskets and buckets to/go into the pantry for winter,/gearing up for the time/when it will all go bad.

While this book provides excellent detail and a thorough account of the younger Pitt's life, it is certainly not a good first book on the period. The author gives a good account of the personality and evolution of Pitt, and the stories and anecdotes are well documented and reasearched. However, the sheer volume of Pitt's contemporaries can be overwhelming, expecially for someone without knowledge of the period. Having said that, I was particularly intrigued by the excellent account of Pitt's parlimentary struggles against his adversaries (Fox in particular). Also, the royal (George III) favor and disfavor of parlimentary leaders is interesting. Pitt emerges as a heroic figure, with unwavering integrity. Additionlly, anyone interested in the history of parlimentary debate, and the focus upon oratory will find no better study than Pitt. The author gives a fine account of Pitt's mastery in this area. I heartily recommend this book, although I would also recommend starting with a more general account of the period for background. This make the detailed account of Pitt's life much easier to follow.

Robin Reilly has entered a field with a vast number of competitors but has acquitted himself admirably. The life of this important stateman, politician and friend has been dealt with in a brief but thorough compass. All the important subjects are covered with ease of expression and satisfactory detail. A good index ensures that one can find topics and persons of note easily. A number of prints are included that are relevant and of good quality. After wading through the huge tombes of Ehrman, Stanhope and Holland Rose Reilly is refreshing and to the point. My first point of call when checking a point in Pitt's life. An excellent book which brings together all the usual information on the statesman in a brief readable compass.

This volume uses as raw material a number of things that rightly make a reader cautious - foreign words (Italian), many external references (Keats, Nero, Hesiod, Newton), an archaic format (acrostic). However, by the second poem the reader should recognize that they are in the hands of a master who uses the raw material to create his art not to impress the reader. Mayes has an unequalled ability to mix in a single poem classical Rome, blue collar America, academia, Italian farming, and Catholic imagery. In this mixture, one sees a unified and reflective life. Unlike most poetry I enjoy, Mayes' poetry does not have well-turned phrases or captivating images that cause certain lines to stand out. Rather, the poems have an internal consistency that discourages focus on individual pieces rather than the whole. Mayes is an uncommonly good contemporary poet, his work well worth getting to know.

Abecedarius is, according to The Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics' first entry, "a poem in which each line or stanza begins with a successive letter of the alphabet." In Works and Days, Mayes runs through the Italian alphabet not line by line, but poem by poem, from "Ago" to "Zappa." In addition, the first word of each poem begins with the same letter as the title and the last word of one poem becomes the title of the next poem.

There's the risk that this scheme is too clever for the poetry's own good, but Mayes' craft comes across subtly, without detracting from the stuff of the lively poems. Despite the pattern, one can't predict where a poem will end up. The poem "Porca Miseria" (Pig Misery) leaps swiftly from the poet's father butchering a hog: "He talked about headcheese / into his eighties" -- to Ovid in exile: "He shouted to his dog / exactly what he himself wanted / to hear: vieni qua, Ovid, vieni qua."

Mayes' poetic voice is distinguished by a quirky, tender humor. Hesiod's seventh century B.C. Works and Days seriously instructs the reader about such things as planting, plowing, footwear, and relieving the bladder. Mayes' version, on the other hand, treats its subjects playful. The instruction that opens the poem "Oliveto" (Olive) begins with a pun: "O / live, dammit, as if your life / depended on it, / I keep telling you."

"My fields are poetry and olives" Mayes writes in "Macchina," with a double entendre on "fields." He turns words over and over as if plowing, as in the poem "Giorni" (Days): "Gather the melone,/small and sweet, hundreds of seeds in the wet center. Think of the seeds //the families have sown, have scattered. It has been all of us here who have / gathered, even casually, such as, I gather that // you're in a hurry, I gather that // this is the last time we'll see each other alive. It is I, talking, speaking correctly,/writing one last word followed by another last word. I somehow need to //gather darkness around me like the shield I want to be carried home on./When we gather, we recognize what we've gathered."

Language, poetry, the Tuscan campi, these are the subjects Mayes celebrates. As he writes of Whitman in the poem "Erbaccia," (Weed) so may we write of him, "Perhaps / he thought the land the greatest / poem."

I agree with mr. niceguy. What is with McCarthy and his excess use of word 'and'? Admittedly, the word 'and' is very important in the English language, however, excessive use of this word is outrageously ignorant, not to mention very distracting? You hear 'and'quite a bit in everyday speech, I admit. But no one really use 'and' like a gazillion times in one sentence, like McCarthy attempts in all of his books, not just in 'All the Pretty Horses'. The first McCarthy's book that I read is 'The Road'and I have to say, it wasn't a bad read, although not very original. Nevertheless, I read on to his other books and it was uncanny how much he tries to be Hemingway, except he does not use the apostrophe for a word like 'didn't' (he writes didnt, how about a good typewriter huh?) nor does he use the quotation marks, just to be original I guess. But hardly, this guy is a hack. I love Hemingway and I appreciate his use of the word 'and' in his writing. This guy is no Hemingway. He just tries too hard to be the great Hemingway and he uses a lot more 'and' than he should. Anyone who reads and loves this guy, I'm sorry to say, is just not willing to admit that, deep down, this guy is untalented, unoriginal, and a hack of Hemingway at best. I would puke, yes puke, if they are stupid enough to award him the Nobel Prize. Well, they did give him the Pulitzer for a book about nothing more than a man, a boy, and a shopping cart with one bad wheel, " The Road" I admit is not a bad read, but for crying out loud, not something deserving of a Pulitzer Prize?

'All the Pretty Horses' is a very well written saga of a teenage boy from Texas, circa 1940s, wandering off down to Mexico with his buddy. Both guys are horsemen. Their Mexican adventure turns sour very quickly and they are then thrust into a mix of love, death and everything in between. The author's prose and characterizations are perfect. The only reason I don't give this book five stars is because I found the heavy use of Spanish dialogue to be very distracting. Although oftentimes one can get the gist of what was being said, too many times I was left puzzled. Yes, the use of Spanish did add quite a bit to the feel of the story. I think it would have been helpful if the author supplied translations (in footnotes, for example).


Bottom line: quite an amazing story, .. and I don't even like horses. Recommended.

I really enjoyed this novel, although it's probably more highly praised than it deserves to be. You can tell its serious literature because of the general lack of punctuation and unconventional composition. McCarthy's writing style is likely to be off-putting to some, but there is a lot to like about this novel. While novels that are branded (rightly or wrongly) as works of serious literature generally have something to say, they often don't have a story to tell. This is something that I really appreciate about McCarthy as an author. There are issues and themes that he clearly wants to explore in his fiction, but he builds his novels (at least the one's I've read) on the foundation of a compelling story.

Ultimately, the theme of this novel reminded me a lot of No Country for Old Men. From my perspective, both novels are essentially about how the world (or at least the Country) is changing and how futile it can be for one man to resist it. In All the Pretty Horses, John Grady Cole romanticizes the cowboy era, a way of life that is fading away, like the setting sun. He stubbornly refuses to compromise his world view, speaking plainly and honestly, doing what he feels is right no matter what the cost, and standing up for what he believes in. Needless to say, this kind of integrity comes with a price and Cole, and his companions suffer greatly for these choices.

McCarthy's prose is at times stark, at times gorgeously realized. Descriptions of the harsh land and vivid sunsets are, at times, quite astonishing. But it is the dialogue in this novel that is especially sharp and insightful. McCarthy draws obvious contrasts between the straight-forward words of John Grady Cole and characters who engage him in philosophical discussions, speaking with eloquence and manipulating language. Some of the best dialogue occurs between Cole and the great aunt of the girl he loves. These passages are worth reading again and again.

I do have a few complaints though. One definite shortcoming is the romance in the story. The character of Alejandra is superficial at best and the entire romance feels a little too contrived. My other complaint might sound strange but I found the action in the final pages of the novel, while compelling, actually held the novel back a little. In the end, the action takes over the final pages of the novel and reflection on the larger issues and themes become secondary. While the pages turn quickly as Cole engages in shootouts and a race across the Mexican badlands, the strength of this novel comes in subtler forms; in the dialogue and ruminations about fate and religion. It's as if the novel abruptly switches gears. While on some level I enjoyed the pacing at the end, I was left with a sense that much of the story's potential had been sacrificed.

McCarthy is fast becoming one of my favorite authors. All the Pretty Horses is not a perfect novel, and perhaps not worthy of all the aclaim it has received, but its well worth reading. 4 1/2 stars.

McCarthy is a great writer, and this a great American novel. The novel is conventionally plotted and very readable. Like "The Road", it is a book that one can love; it does not require the effort that the novels of writers like Pynchon or Dellilo do, nor does it tax the reader's patience. Reader-friendly fiction is a good thing, and the novel's accessability makes it no less literary or substantial.

McCarthy's prose is breathtaking. His descriptions of the landscape, his dialogue (including dialogue between the American hero and a variety of Mexican characters) is flawless, and every now and again McCarthy will deliver lines with the force of a shot to the solar plexus. Literary critics compare him to Faulkner, though sometimes he sounds like Hemingway. It is amazing that McCarthy could be compared to two such different writers. But he does have elements of both, and is a great stylist in his own right. I must say that McCarthy moves me in a way that Faulkner never did.

The protagonist, John Grady Cole, and his sidekick Rawlins are two very appealing characters. Cole's Mexican lover and her family are also complex and ultimately very appealing characters. These may well be the most lovable characters in McCarthy's fiction. This is part of what makes this book so appealing.

McCarthy is a Pulitzer-prize and even Nobel-prize caliber writer because he struggles with ultimate themes. The book is more than a coming of age novel, though for that genre I think it is much better than "The Catcher in the Rye", "A Separate Peace", or "Rule of the Bone." I see the youth of the protagonist as a good device for placing the individual in his proper context vis a vis nature and human society. The individual is small and insignificant compared to nature, and even humanity seems dwarfed in McCarthy's view. Cole struggles to meet his basic needs -- love, craft, survival -- in the face of a hostile world and alien culture.

Most striking is Cole's desire to do the right thing. Ethics seems almost quixotic and comic in the face of the sheer ruthlessness of the natural and man-made forces arrayed against the individual. Cole's decision to go back to his tormentors and reclaim his property is remarkably foolish and self-destructive, but somehow necessary and appealing. In a nice touch at the end of the novel, Cole goes to an American judge for judgment and validation. Ultimately, he's his own harshest critic.

Given Cole's appeal, I find the book to be ultimately positive and humanist in outlook, though perhaps Mr. McCarthy would snicker at this sentiment.

This book is a masterpiece.

Sometime in the 1940s, John Grady Cole and Lacey Rawlins, two Texan teens, head off to Mexico on horseback. Their journey is one of laughter and horror, as these two boys are forced to grow up fast and hard.

That's about the best I can give you for a plot summary. It's amazing that "All the Pretty Horses" runs just over 300 pages. It feels more epic in nature. It IS epic, I suppose; just a short one. McCarthy's prose is as rich and vibrant as ever, though it's a bit more restrained here than in other of his works--I can see why this book is among his more commercially successful novels. Indeed, it's an odd companion to his other great Western piece, "Blood Meridian" (which is arguably a superior book; but then, that's like asking which gold medal shines brighter--there's just no reason to contrast two great literary works). Perhaps this makes "All the Pretty Horses" a good starting point for those interested in reading McCarthy's novels (I also recommend "No Country For Old Men," as it is even leaner and than "Horses"). That's not to say, though, that "All the Pretty Horses" doesn't stand up to the rest of McCarthy's catalogue--it does, admirably so. Cole is an interesting and engaging protagonist, and the way McCarthy switches from humorous scenes to tragic ones reflects the patterns of daily life. "Horses" is an amazing, enriching novel, and Cormac McCarthy is without a doubt one of the best writers/storytellers out there today. They don't call his novels "classics" for nothing.