Failure: Poems

This superb Pulitzer Prize-winning collection gives voice to failure with a wry, deft touch from one of this country's most engaging and uncompromising poets. In "Failure", Philip Schultz evokes the pleasures of family, marriage, beaches, and dogs; New York City in the 1970s; revolutions both interior and exterior; and the terrors of 9/11 with a compassion that demonstrates he is a master of the bittersweet and fierce, the wondrous and direct, and the brilliantly provocative. Filled with poems of "heart-breaking tenderness that [go] beyond mere pity" (Gerald Stern), "Failure" is a collection to savor from this major American poet.

PHILIP SCHULTZ is the author of five collections of poetry, including the National Book Award nominee Like Wings. A recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts, he is also the founder of the Writers Studio in New York.