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Rating: 
Summary: Against Love Poetry
Review: //This is a unique book of poems by
a woman "married thirty years"
who, if you'll pardon the expression,
tells it like it is. It's no surprise that
this book, in particular, has
has raised the hackles of those
who prefer women to write
angst-inspired confessionals as opposed to
what we have here -- the truth. The language, as always, is beautiful. Two of the poems, "Quarantine" and "Thanked Be
Fortune" are fantastic. Read this book first, and judge for yourself.
Rating:
Summary: Against Love Poetry
Review: // This is a unique book of poems by
a woman "married thirty years"
who, if you'll pardon the expression,
tells it like it is. It's no surprise that
this book, in particular, has
has raised the hackles of those
who prefer women to write
angst-inspired confessionals as opposed to
what we have here -- the truth. The language, as always, is beautiful. Two of the poems, "Quarantine" and "Thanked Be
Fortune" are fantastic. Read this book first, and judge for yourself.
Rating:
Summary: a thoroughly enjoyable book
Review: Eavan Boland has made a lasting contribution to modern poetry in English. Her earlier volumes, excluding The Lost Land, explored themes of domesticity, women's creativity, and Irish nationalism in language both lyrical and tough-minded. Her latest collection seems flat and uninspired, as if she is imitating herself. As if she is thinking too much about what she wants to say and not letting her own poetic voice lead the way. Could the problem be that she is now spending too much time in the U.S. as a tenured academic at Stanford? Whatever the cause, I hope she returns to her earlier passion and power.
Rating: 
Summary: A sad decline
Review: I was a great admirer of Ms. Boland's early poems, though what struck me as bold and innovative and fresh in that work has become (or so it seems to me) a sort of tired rhetorical posturing, and a sort of frumpy stylistic manner. Her early authority seems feigned now, and I personally find it hard to account for the flatness and airiness of the poems themselves. I should add that I say all this with a sinking heart, as I had very high hopes for her career.
Rating:
Summary: Fake Irish Poetry
Review: In this most pretentiously titled book, Boland continues to ask us to believe that she speaks for women everywhere and that she has something significant to say about Irish history and politics. It's no accident that she teaches and lives in America--in Ireland we're having none of her. Here she is deeply unpopular, especially among the younger generation of female poets who look to more innovative writers for their models. The problem is that Boland shamelessly courts the establishment with her predictable and traditionalist domestic (domesticated) verse while at the same time striking psuedo-revolutionary academic postures. The poems themselves are flat, frightened and derivative. This is very poor work indeed.
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