Clairvoyant with Hunger: Essays

“Clairvoyant with Hunger consists of fourteen short essays on poems from James Dickey's last book; The Eagle’s Mile; twelve short essays on James Wright's best prose poems; a long essay on Dickey's third novel, To the White Sea; a long essay on W.S. Merwin's 320-page poem, The Folding Cliffs; an essay on the major Iraqi poet Dunya Mikhail; a familiar essay on the Japanese poet, Ryuichi Tamura, whose work I translated for publication during my fellowship year in Japan (l971-72), an essay on four poets for Stephen Berg's anthology on Marianne Moore, Theodore Roethke, D.H. Lawrence and Hart Crane; a long essay on the work of poet David Bottoms; and my own interview for a special feature of my work in Fifth Wednesday Journal in Chicago, Spring 2014. The essays range in location from Chicago to Atlanta, Iraq and Japan.” --Laurence Lieberman

“I believe the best of Lieberman's essays equal Stevens' most shattering and inspiring prose: we understand reality as well as literature with a more humane sense of what we are.” --Stephen Berg, founding editor of The American Poetry Review.

“Laurence Lieberman, himself an excellent poet, is one of the most intelligent and perceptive critics of poetry to be found today.” --Frederick Morgan, founding editor of The Hudson Review.