New and Selected Poems. (Signed presentation by Mary Oliver) With a signed/presentation on the title page: "For Sally and Drew (22nd!) with good wishes to you, Mary Oliver, Oct. 15, 1999."

Oliver, Mary

Published by Beacon Press, Boston, 1998

A very good copy in wrappers printed brightly in red, white, yellow, and black on the front wrapper which also has the National Book Award Winner statement in a yellow circle. With two 2" wavy blue flair horizontal lines at the center of the front endpaper, below the title; otherwise, clean and tight throughout. With a black and white photo of Mary Oliver on the rear wrapper. An attractive copy, with a special signed presentation in black ink on the title page: "For Sally and Drew (22nd!) with good wishes to you, Mary Oliver, Oct. 15, 1999." Presentation copies are becoming quite scarce. Mary Oliver's poetry is grounded in memories ofOhioand her adopted home ofNew England, setting most of her poetry in and around Provincetown after she moved there in the 1960s.[4]Influenced by bothWhitmanandThoreau, she is known for her clear and poignant observances of the natural world. In fact, according to the 1983 Chronology of American Literature, the "American Primitive," one of Oliver's collection of poems, ".presents a new kind of Romanticism that refuses to acknowledge boundaries between nature and the observing self."[11]Her creativity was stirred by nature, and Oliver, an avid walker, often pursued inspiration on foot. Her poems are filled with imagery from her daily walks near her home:[6]shore birds, water snakes, the phases of the moon and humpback whales. InLong lifeshe says "[I] go off to my woods, my ponds, my sun-filled harbor, no more than a blue comma on the map of the world but, to me, the emblem of everything."[4]She commented in a rare interview "When things are going well, you know, the walk does not get rapid or get anywhere: I finally just stop, and write. That's a successful walk!" She said that she once found herself walking in the woods with no pen and later hid pencils in the trees so she would never be stuck in that place again.[4]She often carried a 3-by-5-inch hand-sewn notebook for recording impressions and phrases.[4]Maxine Kumincalled Oliver "a patroller of wetlands in the same way that Thoreau was an inspector of snowstorms."[12]Oliver stated that her favorite poets wereWalt Whitman,Rumi,Hafez,Ralph Waldo Emerson,Percy Bysshe ShelleyandJohn Keats. (Wikipedia) Later printing, a twelfth Edition with the number line beginning with "12" on the copyright page. Seller Inventory # 1387

Bibliographic Details

Title: New and Selected Poems. (Signed presentation...
Publisher: Beacon Press, Boston
Publication Date: 1998
Binding: Soft cover
Signed: Signed by Author(s)