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Title: SPOON RIVER ANTHOLOGY by Edgar Lee Masters ISBN: 0-684-83825-7 Publisher: Touchstone Books Pub. Date: 01 October, 1997 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $10.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.92 (25 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: We Are Spoon River
Comment: There is no Spoon River, IL. Check your map. Several towns argue that they stake their claim in being what Masters asserted to be this mythical town. Petersburg and Lewistown, two towns of otherwise minor repute seem closest... but it is so much better we haven't an actual town... Spoon River's residents are our next door neighbors, whether we live in Central Illinois or Central Florida, or southern Alaska.
Masters has written not fables, but the essence of American life. He hasn't captured the life and times of 1915, but has instead recorded in 1915 the life and times of our present day America.
The same reason the paintings of Norman Rockwell makes sense is why Edgar Lee Masters poetry makes sense. To read the quick messages on the gravestone of one man, learning a little bit him, and something about a neighbor or two, we can learn a little about how we live in communities today.
Our lives, like Jimmy Stewart's character in "It's a Wonderful Life" found out, interact and impact everyone we meet. Who we love, who we should love and who we reject. And when we die, others feel the loss. Masters has aptly put this in a humorous, yet insightful way into short verses.
The poems don't rhyme. The meter is not solid, and the poetics aren't intricate. They aren't poems like Poe's or Dickinson, not in the way they wrote American poems. Don't expect iambic pentameter-based sonnets or villanelles. Expect a conversation, and listen in.
The poetry here is in the subtle use of social nuance. In the nuances are his insight and wit. Two readings will bring to light what you miss in the first.
Buy this book, read it slow. It reads faster than most poetry book, but don't get caught in the temptation to zoom through each poem just because you can.
After you read it, see the play if it happens to be performed in your town.
I fully recommend it.
Anthony Trendl
Rating: 5
Summary: Excellent reading! Rates #1 in "Spoon River Illinois"
Comment: Ilive in Spoon River (Lewistown Illinois) Masters came from here, and he covered human nature at its worst and best after he left here. The book has been at the top of students and in theatres since it was published' I am the historian here in Lewistown Ill. and the characters are as alive today as they were then! It is 'must' reading for all literature lovers, American or English styles. Masters left here in 1894,went to Chicago and New York City and left his mark that can never be erased from the annals of literature. He graduated here from Lewistown High school in 1886, and practised law here. However "Spoon River Anthology" lives on here in the 'valley of the 'unmythical' Spoon River! The book is real, the town is real, and the River is real! In 1925 Masters told in an article review on his "Genesis of Spoon River"....."If there was ever a town called Spoon River" IT IS Lewistown, Illinois!" Read the book, then visit the town in Central Illinois during the autumn Spoon River Scenic Drive Festival Days! Come See the real Spoon River, and see a part of what Masters saw! Human Nature - and nature itself!
Rating: 5
Summary: Great teaching tool
Comment: I use this book in my English 8 classrooms to discuss character sketches and reading and understanding poetry. The students love that it's "kinda" dark and morbid. I like it because the students can focus on one person on "the hill" and not be worried with numerous characters and settings. I've used it in both 8th and 10th grade and the writing that comes from the reading of these poems is amazing.
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Title: Chicago Poems by Carl Sandburg ISBN: 0486280578 Publisher: Dover Pubns Pub. Date: 20 May, 1994 List Price(USD): $1.50 |
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Title: Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson ISBN: 055321439X Publisher: Bantam Pub. Date: 01 March, 1995 List Price(USD): $5.95 |
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Title:The Hill ASIN: B00004Y6U1 Publisher: Overcoat Recordings Pub. Date: 03 October, 2000 List Price(USD): $14.98 Comparison N/A, buy it from Amazon for $14.98 |
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Title: Sanford Meisner on Acting by Dennis Longwell, Sydney Pollack, Sanford Meisner ISBN: 0394750594 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 12 July, 1987 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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Title: Nam: The Vietnam War in the Words of the Men and Women Who Fought There by Mark Baker ISBN: 0815411227 Publisher: Cooper Square Press Pub. Date: May, 2001 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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