{"product_id":"9781555976057","title":"Useless Landscape, or A Guide for Boys : Poems","description":"\u003cstrong\u003eUseless Landscape, or A Guide for Boys\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor(s): D. A. Powell\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e*Winner of the 2012 National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry*\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eI have this rearrangement to make: \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003esymbolic death, my backward glance. \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe way the past is a kind of future \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eleaning against the sporty hood. \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e                  \u003c\/i\u003e—from \"Bugcatching at Twilight\" \u003cbr\u003eIn \u003ci\u003eUseless Landscape, or A Guide for Boys\u003c\/i\u003e - D. A. Powell's fifth book of poetry - the rollicking line he has made his signature becomes the taut, more discursive means to describing beauty, singing a dirge, directing an ironic smile, or questioning who in any given setting is the instructor and who is the pupil. This is a book that explores the darker side of divisions and developments, which shows how the interstitial spaces of boonies, backstage, bathhouse, or bar are locations of desire. With Powell's witty banter, emotional resolve, and powerful lyricism, this collection demonstrates his exhilarating range.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eReview(s):\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e“With his typical wry eroticism, an eagle eye for the places where men converge, and a compass that points always to desire, poet D. A. Powell leads us on a tour through a \u003ci\u003eUseless Landscape, or A Guide for Boys\u003c\/i\u003e, from gay bars to bathhouses and into the backwoods.” —\u003ci\u003eVanity Fair, \"Hot Type\"\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Powell has a perfect ear. . . . [His] great subject is passion, in all its stages and manifestations: passion sought, spent, relived in the mind, played out in language.” —\u003ci\u003eDan Chiasson, The New Yorker\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Taut, edgy, and erotic. . . . [Powell's] wit and brazen perspective make him a poet's poet.” —\u003ci\u003eThe Washington Post\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“In this, his fifth and most elegant and accessible book, [Powell] watches himself aging, his disease making off with his body, his energy and his hope--but not his humor: 'You face your wrinkles, daily, in the mirror. \/ But the wrinkles are so slimming, they rather flatter.' He entreats us, by book's end, to 'triumph over death with me.' It's an invitation--and a poet--you won't be able to resist.” —\u003ci\u003eNational Public Radio, \"Not Your Parents' Poems: A 2012 Poetry Preview\"\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Don't be conused by the title: [Powell] writes rollicking poetry for adults.” —\u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“[D. A. Powell's] masterful fifth book, \u003ci\u003eUseless Landscape, or A Guide for Boys\u003c\/i\u003e, digs deep into the tar pit of language. . . . And while the language is fresh and modern, this is a book about the oldest themes: how quickly time passes, how the past can be regained--if only momentarily--in art, and how to accept the finality of death. . . . \u003ci\u003eUseless Landscape\u003c\/i\u003e is sad and profound, but also wildly brave, often funny, and past a thrilling point of no return.” —\u003ci\u003eCraig Morgan Teicher, National Public Radio\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“\u003ci\u003eUseless Landscape\u003c\/i\u003e might turn out to be the most affecting, as well as the most disturbing, book of poems published this year.” —\u003ci\u003eStephen Burt, Boston Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“[Powell] presents a finely textured atlas of experience and desire. . . . Powell is a renowned formalist; though he does not hew rigidly to rhyme or metrical constraints, there's a chiseled architectonics to his verse. These poems double back on one another, fugally, repeated words acting as secret passageways running from page to page. . . . These elegantly groomed poems give shape to ineffables of love, youth, memory, illness, death.” —\u003ci\u003eSan Francisco Chronicle\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Powell's fifth collection is a stunner. . . . Memory, sensuality, and time all tangle with each other--altering each other as they go. Powell takes us beyond the 'salty declivites' of a Turkish bath into a wilderness of desire, a 'region of want.' There could be no sounder guide.” —\u003ci\u003eBoston Globe\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Few contemporary American poets can lay a better claim to the mantle of a poet of poise than Powell.” —\u003ci\u003eDavid Biespiel, The Oregonian\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Powell's poems are steeped in the grit of American life, the camp, the tragedy, the triumph. Contemporary and historical at once, and with unimpeachable style, we think we'll be talking about this writer for a long time.” —\u003ci\u003eFlavorwire, \"Ten Reasons Poetry's Not Dead\"\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Powell has now turned the corner from promising new poet into established power. [\u003ci\u003eUseless Landscape\u003c\/i\u003e] condenses his obsessions into poems clearer and more compact than ever, some scathing and others comedic, some based on life stories and others built on puns. . . . Powell, with his range of form and line, his dark but vivid humor, and his commitment to Romantic traditions, is set apart. . . . This book will belong on many lists of the year's best.” —\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly (starred review)\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Poems by Powell are the Apple products of the literary world: sleek, urbane, well-designed marvels. . . . Powell is as good a technician as anyone in the business, and his latest book, both smart and accessible, will have award panels queuing up to sing its praises.” —\u003ci\u003eLibrary Journal\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“D. A. Powell tautens his typically sassy-tongued yet emotionally involved writing in [\u003ci\u003eUseless Landscape\u003c\/i\u003e], which explores the bars, bathhouses, and backstage spaces where passion flares.” —\u003ci\u003eBarbara Hoffert, Library Journal, PrePub Alert\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Powell confronts physical and emotional environments in the kinds of translucent lyrics that have gained him critical appreciation and a reputation for accessibility. . . . Powell flexes his command of inflectional forms, using subjunctive constructions to pose some of the most wrenching, lovely unrealities since his initial triptych [\u003ci\u003eTea, Lunch,\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eCocktails\u003c\/i\u003e] and imperatives to exploit creeping, linguistic ambiguity.” —\u003ci\u003eBooklist\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Combining his pleasure in puns and slang with more traditional language and structure (even sestinas and sonnets), Powell drifts over a landscape of central California flora, gay sex, 1970s funk, the physiology of aging, insect control and even high school marching bands. . . . [\u003ci\u003eUseless Landscape\u003c\/i\u003e is] a finely tuned collection from one of America's best contemporary poets.” —\u003ci\u003eShelf Awareness\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“The sonnet, that old form of poetry that Shakespeare made famous, is invigorated in D. A. Powell's new book . . . Powell navigates his way through [scenarios] that could easily become [caricatures], or that could be viewed as self-indulgent, and gives us instead what he always gives us: a portrait of unresolved complexity.” —\u003ci\u003eThe Fine Print, New York Daily News\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“[\u003ci\u003eUseless Landscape\u003c\/i\u003e is] a volume full of revealing self-conflict; it includes clarity and opacity, evasions and embraces, rhetorical flourishes and potty mouths . . . Powell has great stylistic range.” —\u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShort-listed L.A. Times Book Prize - Finalist (2013), National Books Critics Circle Awards - Nominee (2012), Nominated National Book Critics Circle Awards - Nominee (2012), Winner National Book Critics Circle Awards - Winner (2012)\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eISBN:  9781555976057\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e ","brand":"Graywolf Press","offers":[{"title":"Hardback","offer_id":40594876760270,"sku":"9781555976057","price":22.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0600\/7029\/7806\/products\/getimage_63779c74-67bd-4c7c-8b45-e4c9af6afab4.jpg?v=1637820415","url":"https:\/\/pickwickbookshop.com\/products\/9781555976057","provider":"Pickwick Bookshop","version":"1.0","type":"link"}