issue 32 > nonfiction
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Don Riggs. Bilateral Asymmetry.
Review by L.S. BassenOne of the aspects of getting older is a palpable sensation of time as if it were weather or a season. A corollary is the feeling of being displaced, replaced, like a wave on a shore. Aging can feel okay in the scheme of things, but it also inspires resistance. Dylan Thomas's exhortation to fight against going "gentle into that good night" is a useful mantra. Regarding poetry, another facet of maturity is a facility and preference for form.
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Siri Hustvedt. The Blazing World.
Essay by L.S. BassenTwo superb reviews that detailed the plot, characters, and concerns of The Blazing World prompted me to read Siri Hustvedt for the first time. ...Though the two reviews pretty much said it all, after I read the book I needed to vent. But I could hear Emily Dickinson's "I'm Nobody" loud and clear:
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Lewis Turco. The Familiar Stranger.
Review by Miriam N. KotzinThis book is a gift to readers who will find a treasure in Turco's accomplished poems, not only for the craft and genius of composition, but for the plentitude of acute observations of the natural world and human nature.
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One Berlin
by M.G. Piety“Es gibt nur ein Berlin” (there’s only one Berlin) is a cabaret song made famous by Claire Waldoff in the 1920s. But, of course, for many years, that was not true. From 1949-1990 there were two Berlins–East and West. There were two Berlins the first time I came to the city in 1982 as a college student on a foreign-study program. I was mesmerized by the city. It had a special energy that I think was the result of being surrounded by East Germany. I had not realized that all of Berlin, not just the Eastern half of it, was actually inside East Germany. Since there was a West Berlin, I’d assumed the city was on the border between East and West Germany, with half being on the Western side and the other half on the Eastern side. It wasn’t until I’d entered the city, after a very arduous trek through East Germany, that I came to understand the geography of the place and even then I found it hard to believe.
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