''Modern Poetry'' is a 2024 poetry collection by Diane Seuss, published by

Graywolf Press Graywolf Press is an independent, non-profit publisher located in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Graywolf Press publishes fiction, non-fiction, and poetry. Graywolf Press collaborates with organizations such as the College of Saint Benedict, the Mel ...

. Seuss' sixth poetry collection, it won the 2024 Heartland Booksellers Association Award for Poetry and was designated a finalist for the 2024

National Book Award for Poetry The National Book Award for Poetry is one of five annual National Book Awards, which are given by the National Book Foundation to recognize outstanding literary work by US citizens. They are awards "by writers to writers".

Content

The book's title was derived from a textbook of the same name that Seuss studied in school. Accordingly, the book's poems contend with the nature of poetry—Seuss called the book "a parody of a textbook"—specifically

Romantic poetry Romantic poetry is the poetry of the Romantic era, an artistic, literary, musical and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century. It involved a reaction against prevailing Neoclassical ideas of the 18th c ...

and

John Keats John Keats (31 October 1795 – 23 February 1821) was an English poet of the second generation of Romantic poets, along with Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley. His poems had been in publication for less than four years when he died of tub ...

, one of the poets which Seuss deeply studied. In ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. It was founded on February 21, 1925, by Harold Ross and his wife Jane Grant, a reporter for ''The New York T ...

'', Seuss stated that she began to reckon with and even question the point of poetry during the loss of several loved ones and the alienation of the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

. After writing '' Frank: sonnets'' in 2021, Seuss "needed to turn a corner, as one must, into the next book or sequence or whatever" which ultimately led her to the "dire" interrogation of poetry writ large.

Critical reception

In a starred review, ''

Publishers Weekly ''Publishers Weekly'' (''PW'') is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers, and literary agents. Published continuously since 1872, it has carried the tagline, "The International News Magazine of ...

'' concluded that "These irreverent, pulsing, and defiant poems are full of dangerous good sense." Many critics lauded Seuss' reflection and interrogation of her own art form.

Hanif Abdurraqib Hanif Abdurraqib (formerly Hanif Willis-Abdurraqib; born 1983) is an American poet, essayist, and cultural critic. His first essay collection, ''They Can't Kill Us Until They Kill Us'', was published in 2017. His 2021 essay collection ''A Little ...

, writing for ''

'', said "The collection—sometimes playfully, sometimes with earnest curiosity, sometimes dismissively—tries to answer the question of poetry’s utility, and does so by sweeping through multiple forms, summoning the dead". ''The Chicago Review of Books'' stated that "The collection is a glorious origin story, describing the coup de foudre that Seuss encountered with her chosen profession, her calling really, grounded in experiences that didn’t follow the traditional—or patriarchical— trajectory of academe and ivy". The

Poetry Foundation The Poetry Foundation is a United States literary society that seeks to promote poetry and lyricism in the wider culture. It was formed from ''Poetry'' magazine, which it continues to publish, with a 2003 gift of $200 million from philanthrop ...

wrote that the "post-Romantic lyric autobiography ... in reinventing the 19th- and 20th-century poetic canons, deconstructs how poems and poets are made, and what poems mean." ''Preposition Magazine'' likened Seuss' introspection to that of ''

Sentimental Education ''Sentimental Education'' (French: ''L'éducation sentimentale'') is an 1869 novel by Gustave Flaubert. The story focuses on the romantic life of a young man named Frédéric Moreau at the time of the French Revolution of 1848 and the founding o ...

'' by

Gustave Flaubert Gustave Flaubert ( , ; ; 12 December 1821 – 8 May 1880) was a French novelist. He has been considered the leading exponent of literary realism in his country and abroad. According to the literary theorist Kornelije Kvas, "in Flaubert, realis ...

. ''The New York Journal of Books'' compared it to ''

Letters to a Young Poet ''Letters to a Young Poet'' (original title, in German: ''Briefe an einen jungen Dichter'') is a collection of ten letters written by the Bohemian-Austrian poet Rainer Maria Rilke (1875–1926) to Franz Xaver Kappus (1883–1966), a 19-year- ...

'' by

Rainer Maria Rilke René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke (4 December 1875 – 29 December 1926), known as Rainer Maria Rilke, was an Austrian poet and novelist. Acclaimed as an Idiosyncrasy, idiosyncratic and expressive poet, he is widely recognized as ...

. Other critics observed the book's imagery and technical construction. ''

LitHub ''Literary Hub'' or ''LitHub'' is a daily literary website that was launched in 2015 by Grove Atlantic president and publisher Morgan Entrekin, American Society of Magazine Editors Hall of Fame editor Terry McDonell, and ''Electric Literature'' ...

'' pointed out its "powerful images" and "provocative images" as well as Seuss' "rigor blended with a rare wildness." ''Interview'' observed the musicality of some poems and the pastoralism of others.

References

{{reflist 2024 poetry books American poetry collections