This Dialogue of One

Literary Nonfiction. Essays. Poetry. Winner of the 2015 Pegasus Award for Poetry Criticism from The Poetry Foundation. This immensely readable, informative, and witty series of essays by Mark Ford collects some of his best writing on poets and poetry, originally published in London Review of Books and the New York Review of Books. This is a book all lovers of great poetry will want to own and read.



THIS DIALOGUE OF ONE collects thirteen essays on English, French and American poets by one of the era's most engaging and highly esteemed poet-critics. Like Randall Jarrell, whose achievement is assessed here, Ford combines a refreshing openness to innovation with an authoritative awareness of what makes a poem stand the test of time. Witty, astute and wide-ranging, Ford demonstrates his formidable gifts as a close reader of poetry, whether exploring canonical works by the likes of Whitman, Dickinson, Baudelaire and T.S. Eliot, or championing the cause of neglected figures such as James Thomson, Samuel Greenberg and Joan Murray. As John Lanchester once observed of Ford's essays, If more literary criticism were like this, more people would read it.



In addition to a poet's love of language, Mark Ford has the range, erudition, and broad sympathies of a first- rate critic. Whether he is writing about masters like Whitman and Baudelaire or lesser-known poets like James Thomson and Joan Murray, Ford's insights into the work, life, and times of a writer combine to create a thoughtful portrait. Anyone who reads poetry will learn from and enjoy THIS DIALOGUE OF ONE.--Adam Kirsch