Poetry Will Save Your Life

Starred review from May 29, 2017
Bialosky (History of a Suicide) weaves 51 poems by several writers into her latest memoir, which beautifully conveys the “mystery and wonder” of poetry. Born in 1950s Cleveland, Bialosky was a toddler when her father died; though she was close with her mother and sisters, she yearned for the “tenderness and love” that she imagined a father would have provided. As she grew older, Bialosky found the tenderness she was longing for in poetry. A bookish, reserved teen, she attended college in Vermont and Ohio and then became an editor in New York (she’s currently an executive editor at Norton), holding fast to her desire to write and live an independent, creative life. As the years pass in her story, Bialosky touches on familiar themes—young love, faith, grief and loss, political issues, sexuality—and intersperses vignettes from her life with the works of Robert Frost, W.H. Auden, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and Sharon Olds. Readers will learn about how the “personal and communal” aspects of poetry intertwine for her, and will also discover how poems resonated with the author at specific times in her development (e.g., the loneliness of childhood is recalled in a poem by Rilke; as a new mother, Bialosky finds joy in Sylvia Plath’s “Nick and the Candlestick”). Bialosky also includes some fascinating facts about the poets themselves (Robert Louis Stevenson loved The Arabian Knights; Emily Dickinson saw the publication of only 12 of her 1,800 poems). Bialosky’s memoir is equally an enjoyable learning experience and an intimate rendering of a poet’s passion for words.

May 15, 2017
A celebrated poet, novelist, memoirist, and editor returns with an account of a life lived to the music of poetry.Norton executive editor Bialosky (The Players, 2015, etc.) traces her life by discussing poems that are significant to her or that comment in some fashion on life's various mileposts. Beginning with early childhood and Robert Frost's "The Road Not Taken," she continues to the present, pausing to focus on specific works and, in some cases, on the lives of poets. Her sections are short and focused--"Discovery," "Shame," "Depression," "Sexuality," "Ancestors"--and many of the works and poets will be familiar to most readers: Frost, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Shakespeare, Keats, Langston Hughes, Emily Dickinson, Wallace Stevens. But Bialosky introduces some artists who are less familiar in the popular culture: Stanley Plumly, Eavan Boland, Adam Zagajewski. The author uses this format to deal with moments of joy, crisis, surprise, and horror in her life, including the dawning awareness of her love for poetry, the death of her father, the ensuing frustrations of her mother, the struggle to find love, her loss of two newborns, and the suicide of her little sister--a loss Bialosky wrote about in History of a Suicide: My Sister's Unfinished Life (2011). At times, when the poet's life is especially relevant, she will tell us a bit about that person (Sylvia Plath); at other times, she offers very little biography (Edwin Arlington Robinson). Although her conception and presentation are fresh and original, Bialosky sometimes slips on a cliche lying in her path--e.g., her blood ran cold when she first read Anne Frank; seeing an attractive young man caused her to feel "like a Christmas tree all lit up." Thankfully, such bumps in the road are infrequent. An emotional, sometimes-wrenching account of how lines of poetry can be lifelines.

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July 1, 2017

Bialosky, who is an executive editor at W.W. Norton publishing and the author of several poetry collections, novels, and the best-selling memoir History of a Suicide: My Sister's Unfinished Life, has written an examination of her own life through the poems she has loved. Poetry has been her companion through both the good and horrific moments. This book connects Bialosky's most beloved poems and personal experiences to the universal truths of poetry. The poems she admires most come from a diverse group of poets. She chose Robert Frost's "The Road Not Taken," which she memorized in the fourth grade and has carried with her as a sort of touchstone of her experience, and also mentions e.e. cummings and Emily Dickinson, among others. Her tastes are eclectic and not limited to any particular poetic form. VERDICT Bialosky's attention to detail and love of language serve the reader well. This is a book to savor. [See Prepub Alert, 12/19/16.]--Pam Kingsbury, Univ. of North Alabama, Florence

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

August 1, 2017
All facets of poet, novelist, memoirist, and editor Bialosky's literary pursuits coalesce in this graceful and inspiriting entwinement of memories, poetry, and interpretation. Bialosky substantiates her assertion that poetry is lifesaving with superbly selected poems incisively linked to her experiences and beautifully elucidated. As she recounts her suburban Cleveland childhood shadowed by her father's early death and her mother's depression, Bialosky revisits common first poems, including Robert Frost's The Road Not Taken, and remembers being at once enchanted and puzzled by poetry, apt responses at any age. The shock of a field trip that traversed a poor city neighborhood is paired with Langston Hughes' You and Your Whole Race. Sexual awakening and bouts with loneliness are matched with boldly searing lyrics by Sylvia Plath and Sharon Olds. Bialosky's dramatic account of sorrows, struggles, and discoveries told with candor and humor propels readers forward, while poems by Louise Bogan, Gwendolyn Brooks, Li-Young Lee, W. S. Merwin, Adrienne Rich, Wallace Stevens, and many more instigate contemplation. With brief poet biographies, this is a resplendent and invaluable anthology and an involving, richly illuminating narrative.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)