Word: pastan
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Jaskowiak of Winthrop House, Susanna L. Kim of Quincy House, Diane J. Klein of North House, Toby D. Kosowski of Quincy House, Yoon-Sun Lee of Lowell House, Arabella T. Leet of Winthrop House, Jessica E. Levin of Winthrop House, Eve C. Ostriker of Cabot House, Rachel J. Pastan of Dudley House, Deborah S. Porterfield of Winthrop House, Nara Schoenberg of Lowell House, and Katrina Z. Schwartz of Quincy House...
...roles Pastan is not so matter-of-fact about is one we all must play at some point: the role of survivor. People are a source of life in Pastan's poetry--her children, her husband/lover, herself. When someone dies, her sense of creativity utters a gasp apart from mourning; its food has been wrenched away. But Pastan remains clam about the way life seems to decay after the death of a loved one. With the lines: The world is shedding - its thousand skins. she survives a funeral by noticing how mourners see the whole world as dry and falling...
...SEARCH for continuity to escape shock. Pastan goes back through Biblical legend tracing Judaic myth and history. Her idea is not to create an identity for herself but rather to find a universal past or one that can be shared with at least other Jews. In a poem somewhat formidably titled "A Short History of Judaic thought in the Twentieth Century," the poet scratches her bead at the intellectual custom of answering a question with a question. If it is forbidden to touch a dying person except to remove him from a burning house. Pastan asks, who can she touch...
...Pastan's language is simple even spare. Usually it lends itself well to her subjects-- with complicated imaged and twists of thought there is no need for flowery language. But every so often a poem is skimpy. Because Pastan's only point of view is the poet looking out the voice dues not shift. The only source of excitement is what she sees. When the language becomes too terse, a poem might flop unless read very slowly. Fortunately, there are not many of these...
...ranging from rejection of female ideas by an audience unused to them to the observation with suicide that many women poets seem to have. A few contemporary poets - notably Mazine Kumnin and Denise Levertov - have overcome these problems. By Confronting the creative struggle head on without becoming obsessed Linda Pastan joints their ranks...