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Book Cover for: Cairo Traffic, Lloyd Schwartz

Cairo Traffic

Lloyd Schwartz

In Cairo Traffic, his third book of poems, Lloyd Schwartz asks the Sphinx to explain the riddle "about, you know, / Time and Power and Families-the one you think you / have the answer to. Tell me your answer! / No . . . don't." The search for answers takes the poet to some surprising, often phantasmagoric places, and back again to the self, to dreams, to home, and even to the nursing home where his mother-sphinxlike herself-becomes the person asking the dark questions and providing some unexpected answers. These extraordinary narratives-funny and frightening, seductive and profoundly moving-explore the intersections of character and language, the places where common speech mysteriously transforms itself into poetry. This book, which includes several translations of contemporary Brazilian poems, confirms Schwartz's growing reputation as an intensely compelling and original poet.

Book Details

  • Publisher: University of Chicago Press
  • Publish Date: Oct 1st, 2000
  • Pages: 83
  • Language: English
  • Edition: undefined - undefined
  • Dimensions: 8.55in - 6.17in - 0.33in - 0.33lb
  • EAN: 9780226741932
  • Categories: American - General

About the Author

Schwartz, Lloyd: - Lloyd Schwartz is the Frederick S. Troy Professor of English Emeritus at the University of Massachusetts Boston, a longtime commentator on classical music and the arts for National Public Radio's Fresh Air, and a noted editor of Elizabeth Bishop's poetry and prose. He has been awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism, Guggenheim and National Endowment for the Arts fellowships in poetry, and the Poet Laureateship of the city of Somerville, Massachusetts. His poems have appeared in the New Yorker, New Republic, and Atlantic, and have been selected for the Pushcart Prize, The Best American Poetry, and The Best of the Best American Poetry. Among his poetry books are Little Kisses, Cairo Traffic, and Goodnight, Gracie, all published by the University of Chicago Press.

More books by Lloyd Schwartz

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Book Cover for: Music in and on the Air, Lloyd Schwartz
Book Cover for: Goodnight, Gracie, Lloyd Schwartz
Book Cover for: Golden Streetcar: Volume II, Issue I, Lloyd Schwartz