A Short History of the Shadow Poems

Luminous new poems from one who "has long been a poet of gorgeous description" William Logan,The New Criterion Landscape, as Wang Wei says, softens the sharp edges of isolation. Don't just do something, sit there. And so I have, so I have, the seasons curling around me like smoke, Gone to the end of the earth and back without a sound. from "Body and Soul II" This is Charles Wright's first collection of verse since the gathering, inNegative Blue, of his "Appalachian Book of the Dead," a trilogy of trilogies hailed "among the great long poems of the century" (James Longenbach,Boston Review). InA Short History of the Shadow, Wright's return to the landscapes of his early work finds his art resilient in a world haunted by death and the dead. Charles Wrightwas awarded the National Book Award in Poetry in 1983 forCountry Musicand the 1995 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize forChickamauga. In 2008, he was honored for his lifetime achievement with the Rebekah Johnson Bobbitt National Prize for Poetry. He teaches at the University of Virginia, in Charlottesville. This is Wright's first collection of verse since the gathering, inNegative Blue, of the three books he called hisAppalachian Book of the Deadan extended work "sure to be counted among the great long poems of the century" (James Longenbach,Boston Review). In these new poems, Wright speaks and muses in the modes of pastoral, elegy, and homagemethods of poetic address he has made his ownwith characteristic restlessness, wit, perception, and meditative insight. InA Short History of the Shadow, in a world haunted by death and the dead, Wright's return to the landscapes of his early work finds his art, as ever, resilient, haunting, and singular. "The premier poet in America . . . No one makes the music Charles Wright makes."Virginia Quarterly Review "The premier poet in America . . . No one makes the music Charles Wright makes."Virginia Quarterly Review "Wright, Tennessean by birth and Italian by sensibility (he taught himself to write by translating Montale in the sixties), invokes Dante with an Appalachian tongue."The New Yorker "[Wright] finds the sublime in the unlikeliest places, and at his best makes you think such places are exactly where to look."William Logan,The New Criterion "There are precious few poets in whose work I find as much sheer wisdom as in Wright's . . . The whole world seems to orbit in a kind of meditative, slow circle around Wright's grave influence."David Baker,Poetry "Wright, who wrote his first poem as an Army intelligence officer in Italy in 1959 after reading Erza Pound, studied at the Iowa Writer's Workshop when poetry was moving from formal verse to free verse. Carefully constructed pieces of architecture made to look breezy and effortless, his poems reflect those opposing forces. Reading his work [transports] you to another world."Amy Sparks,The Cleveland Plain Dealer "[Readers] will find their efforts well rewarded by the vividness and inventiveness of this poet's descriptive writing, by the evocative music of his language, and by the centrality of the issues he raises as he explores the human condition . . . These poems will assuredly spark keen insights in their readers and will deepen appreciation for the continuing excellence of Wright's artistic achievement."John Lang,Appalachian Heritage "No attentive reader would ever mistake Wright's

Charles Wright teaches at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville.