Poetry
![Louise Glück - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_B00456MRV0.jpg)
Winter Recipes from the Collective: Poems
WINNER OF THE NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE
A haunting new book by a poet whose voice speaks of all our lifetimes
Louise Glück's thirteenth book is among her most haunting. Here as in the Wild Iris there is a chorus, but the speakers are entirely human, simultaneously spectral and ancient. Winter Recipes from the Collective is chamber music, an invitation into that privileged realm small enough for the individual instrument to make itself heard, dolente, its line sustained, carried, and then taken up by the next instrument, spirited, animoso, while at the same time being large enough to contain a whole lifetime, the inconceivable gifts and losses of old age, the little princesses rattling in the back of a car, an abandoned passport, the ingredients of an invigorating winter sandwich, a sister's death, the joyful presence of the sun, its brightness measured by the darkness it casts.
"Some of you will know what I mean," the poet says, by which she means, some of you will follow me. Hers is the sustaining presence, the voice containing all our lifetimes, "all the worlds, each more beautiful than the last." This magnificent book couldn't have been written by anyone else, nor could it have been written by the poet at any other time in her life.
A haunting new book by a poet whose voice speaks of all our lifetimes
Louise Glück's thirteenth book is among her most haunting. Here as in the Wild Iris there is a chorus, but the speakers are entirely human, simultaneously spectral and ancient. Winter Recipes from the Collective is chamber music, an invitation into that privileged realm small enough for the individual instrument to make itself heard, dolente, its line sustained, carried, and then taken up by the next instrument, spirited, animoso, while at the same time being large enough to contain a whole lifetime, the inconceivable gifts and losses of old age, the little princesses rattling in the back of a car, an abandoned passport, the ingredients of an invigorating winter sandwich, a sister's death, the joyful presence of the sun, its brightness measured by the darkness it casts.
"Some of you will know what I mean," the poet says, by which she means, some of you will follow me. Hers is the sustaining presence, the voice containing all our lifetimes, "all the worlds, each more beautiful than the last." This magnificent book couldn't have been written by anyone else, nor could it have been written by the poet at any other time in her life.
Editorial Reviews
"An exquisitely small collection―the way an atom that contains the world is small―that further solidifies Glück's place as one of the eminent poets of our time . . . These recipes for winter offer a robust meal that feeds both spirit and soul, about the nature of life, and time, prepared by one of our finest poets." ―Mandana Chaffa, The Chicago Review of Books
"Glück's work builds on an inquiring sense of wonder over our human experience and fortitude . . . The Nobel committee praised the 'austere beauty' of Glück's poems; this marvelous collection adds warmth and wit." ―Raúl Niño, Booklist (Starred Review)
"[Glück is] a fastidiously exact truth-teller; her lucid poems pretend to a plainness that's really the simplicity of something more fully worked out than the rest of us can manage . . . [Winter Recipes from the Collective] examines close relationships without the sweetener of correct sentiment, recording the universal stages of human life through a woman's experience. We're back in the stylised, half-dreamed Glück landscapes that are rural equivalents of an Edward Hopper painting, and back with her astonishing poetry, as the world goes by, / All the worlds, each more beautiful than the last." ―Fiona Sampson, The Guardian (UK)
"It seems to me that Glück's preoccupations are what poetry is for . . . [Her voice] is dazzlingly, thrillingly cold, like the coldness of nights we call glittering." ―Elisa Gabbert, The New York Times
"[Winter Recipes from the Collective] mines the variegated beats of human existence for something shared and intimate . . . beckoning the reader to enter in conversation with one of the great poets of our times." ―Kevin Lozano, Vulture
"Glück considers a primary human loneliness in humane, reflective poems that are deeply engaged with the idea of being alone with oneself . . . With this magnificent collection, a great poet delivers a treatise on how to live and die." ―Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)
"Robert Frost said the work of poetry is 'getting into danger legitimately so that we may be genuinely rescued.' After half a century of sizing up the dangers that disturb the soul, Glück is tending to the redemptive part of the poet's mission. In doing so, she's able to draw on the benefits of age: looking back on past periods of darkness, she's in a position to tell us with some authority that they are survivable (and worth surviving) . . . I imagine I'll be finding solace in this book for the rest of my life." ―Andrew Chan, 4 Columns
"Glück's images are crisp and fable-like, her language deceptively accessible, but her poems resist any kind of definitive interpretation: You have to decide what they mean for...
"Glück's work builds on an inquiring sense of wonder over our human experience and fortitude . . . The Nobel committee praised the 'austere beauty' of Glück's poems; this marvelous collection adds warmth and wit." ―Raúl Niño, Booklist (Starred Review)
"[Glück is] a fastidiously exact truth-teller; her lucid poems pretend to a plainness that's really the simplicity of something more fully worked out than the rest of us can manage . . . [Winter Recipes from the Collective] examines close relationships without the sweetener of correct sentiment, recording the universal stages of human life through a woman's experience. We're back in the stylised, half-dreamed Glück landscapes that are rural equivalents of an Edward Hopper painting, and back with her astonishing poetry, as the world goes by, / All the worlds, each more beautiful than the last." ―Fiona Sampson, The Guardian (UK)
"It seems to me that Glück's preoccupations are what poetry is for . . . [Her voice] is dazzlingly, thrillingly cold, like the coldness of nights we call glittering." ―Elisa Gabbert, The New York Times
"[Winter Recipes from the Collective] mines the variegated beats of human existence for something shared and intimate . . . beckoning the reader to enter in conversation with one of the great poets of our times." ―Kevin Lozano, Vulture
"Glück considers a primary human loneliness in humane, reflective poems that are deeply engaged with the idea of being alone with oneself . . . With this magnificent collection, a great poet delivers a treatise on how to live and die." ―Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)
"Robert Frost said the work of poetry is 'getting into danger legitimately so that we may be genuinely rescued.' After half a century of sizing up the dangers that disturb the soul, Glück is tending to the redemptive part of the poet's mission. In doing so, she's able to draw on the benefits of age: looking back on past periods of darkness, she's in a position to tell us with some authority that they are survivable (and worth surviving) . . . I imagine I'll be finding solace in this book for the rest of my life." ―Andrew Chan, 4 Columns
"Glück's images are crisp and fable-like, her language deceptively accessible, but her poems resist any kind of definitive interpretation: You have to decide what they mean for...
