The Dead and the Living

Rating:
Summary: This book made me feel dirty
Review: Due to Sharon Olds' ambiguous subjects, it is difficult to know if she is talking about a child or a lover. I was assigned this book in college, and my classmates and I jokingly referred to it as "kiddie porn." Half of the class thought she was sensually admiring her lover's genitals, while the other half insisted she was lovingly watching her children grow. I am not sure if she intentionally created a vague subject, but I felt dirty after reading this book.

Rating:
Summary: Running with Wolves
Review: I discovered Sharon Olds' poetry while reading the anthology The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart, which includes several of her poems, most notably (for me) "The Race." I followed through by reading Satan Says and The Dead and the Living. For me, Olds' poetry combines sensuous, keenly observed (and keenly felt), images with searing emotion in a way that achieves an intensity that is, at times, trance inducing. In The Dead and the Living, Olds' writing is grounded in personal family experiences which included, during her childhood, shuddering, shattering incidents of abuse. I found the poems raw, edgy, blunt, earthy, but also subtle, exploring many dimensions of family experience over several genertions. There is something about the work which blends both rage and understanding, an ability to move through without forgetting. Two examples would be the "The Killer" and "The Sign of Saturn" in which Olds reflects on the shadow she sees (or imagines) in her own children. I found The Living and the Dead more alert to the complexity of evil than the earlier book Satan Says, but no more detached from its horror. I'm looking forward to reading her most recent poems to see how her perspectives may have evolved. In my opinion, this a very serious woman (in the best sense of the word serious), who knows her way around both the day world and the underworld and can hold the tension between.

Rating:
Summary: Go see a therapist
Review: I like to think myself a poet. When I pick up a pen I am feeling out my life through the tiny cuts and scars of my hands. I am reaching for feeling and the heavy bud of truth. Sharon Olds has taught me words so bloody-red raw that filling myself with line after line of her beautiful, startling images has become a way for me to feed my own poetry addiction. She has taught me to find that pure, burning place inside myself so I might release it all through my own inky heart. The Dead and the Living is a masterpiece. Each poem burns with my desire to know more about this strong woman and her survival. I learn her emotion through "The Forms," in which she reveals the way she has been bent beneath every kind of love. Poem after poem reveals a kind of learned pain in which she concludes that even the sharpest parts of life can sometimes hold a soft spot. Every word dropped from her lip has me spooning and scraping and fighting for one more swallow. I lay this book on the kitchen counter where the sun is just going down, and I press my forehead hard against it. I feel the way pain must feel-- the way life and love must feel-- when you are knowing, breathing, living it through the beautiful flutters of another's shadow.

Rating:
Summary: Go see a therapist
Review: Sharon Olds needs to stop writing poetry and instead she needs to go see a therapist; at least the therapist will get paid to hear her whine.

Rating:
Summary: Emotional Depth and Maturity
Review: The Dead and the Living displays great emotional depth and maturity as Olds explores the world of familial relationships. The structure of the collection provides a fluidity of progression from poem to poem, subject to subject. One reads through Olds' poetry as though compelled to turn each page. But be sure you pause to reflect on these poems and their stunning use of language. Olds knows how to turn a phrase for just the right effect. She takes great pains to set down only the most perfect word. There are no throwaway lines here. Her poems are tight and powerful. This is a wonderful collection to introduce you to a fine and important contemporary poet.

Rating:
Summary: hauntingly beautiful
Review: The most deeply moving poetry book I have ever read. Spectacular.