''Versed'' is a book of poetry written by

Rae Armantrout Rae Armantrout (born April 13, 1947) is an American poet generally associated with the Language poets. She has published more than two dozen books, including both poetry and prose. Armantrout was awarded the 2009 National Book Critics Circle Aw ...

and published by

Wesleyan University Press Wesleyan University Press is a university press that is part of Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut. The press is currently directed by Suzanna Tamminen, a published poet and essayist. History and overview Founded (in its present form ...

in 2009 (see

2009 in poetry Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature (for instance, Irish poetry, Irish or French poetry, France). Events * January 5 – The Turkish poetry, Turkish government announces it will posthumously r ...

). It won the 2009 National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry and the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry after being named a finalist for the

National Book Award The National Book Awards (NBA) are a set of annual U.S. literary awards. At the final National Book Awards Ceremony every November, the National Book Foundation presents the National Book Awards and two lifetime achievement awards to authors. ...

. Armantrout is only the third poet to win two out of these three awards in one year.

Awards

As part of a lead-in to their awards announcement, NBCC board member James Marcus called ''Versed'' a collection of "vigilant, often beautiful poems

hat A hat is a Headgear, head covering which is worn for various reasons, including protection against weather conditions, ceremonial reasons such as university graduation, religious reasons, safety, or as a fashion accessory. Hats which incorpor ...

seem to reset the reader’s mental instrumentation—what Armantrout calls the '

whirligig A whirligig is an object that spins or whirls, or has at least one part that spins or whirls. It can also be a Pinwheel (toy), pinwheel, Top (toy), spinning top, buzzer, comic weathervane, gee-haw, spinner, whirlygig, whirlijig, whirlyjig, whirl ...

/ of attention, / the figuring and / reconfiguring / of charges / among orbits / (obits) / that has taken forever.'" According to the Pulitzer Prize Board, ''Versed'' is a "book striking for its wit and linguistic inventiveness, offering poems that are often little thought-bombs detonating in the mind long after the first reading."

References

External links

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Author/Poet Rae Armantrout 10/17/09
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YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

, reading from ''Versed'' at Litquake PubCrawl,

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

2009 poetry books American poetry collections Pulitzer Prize for Poetry–winning works National Book Critics Circle Award–winning works Wesleyan University Press books