A collection of playfully elucidating essays, to help reluctant poetry readers become well-versed in verse.
Developed from Adam Sol’s popular blog, How a Poem Moves is a collection of 35 short essays that walks readers through an array of contemporary poems. Sol is a dynamic teacher, and in these essays, he has captured the humor and engaging intelligence for which he is known in the classroom. With a breezy style, Sol delivers essays that are perfect for a quick read or to be grouped together as a curriculum.
Though How a Poem Moves is not a textbook, it demonstrates poetry’s range and pleasures through encounters with individual poems that span traditions, techniques, and ambitions. This illuminating book is for readers who are afraid they ‘don’t get’ poetry, but who believe that, with a welcoming guide, they might conquer their fear and cultivate a new appreciation.
‘In short, conversational essays that tease out music and meaning in equal measure, Adam Sol explores the living, beating heart of poetry. With an eye to poets of diverse backgrounds and aesthetic modes, and featuring impromptu asides on rhythm and meter, How a Poem Moves is just as at home in the university classroom as the doctor’s waiting room. Rich with lively commentary and shrewd insight, these essays trace a sharp and considerate mind at work. Sol is a thoughtful and affable guide to ignite - or reignite - a love of poetry.’ - Cassidy McFadzean, award-winning author of Hacker Packer
‘How a Poem Moves is the perfect antidote to the condition commonly known as Fear of Poetry. And Adam Sol is the perfect companion on this tour of the sounds, sights, and emotional delights of poetry. As someone who’s spent most of her life reading and writing poems, I’m thrilled by Sol’s ability to describe what he loves in a way that teaches me to see it, too.’ - Tracy K. Smith, U.S. Poet Laureate and Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Life on Mar
‘This unassuming book provides a great public service - it removes the shroud of mystery that hovers between too many readers and the world of poetry…Sol deserves to be read widely and freely; his humble witness to the simple art of reading may be this book’s most important gift. Libraries should have multiple copies.’ - Library Journal, Starred Review
‘There is something delightfully casual about Sol’s observations, one that doesn’t sacrifice critical acumen or scholarly purpose, but one that can be enjoyed by both the casual reader and literary insider, and his list of subjects move outward from his own reading interest to the wider literary community…The strength of the collection comes from his extensive knowledge, written in such a way as to allow everyone in.’ - Rob Mclennan’s blog
