The Father
by Sharon Olds
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Description
The Father is a sequence of poems, a daughter's vision of a father's illness and death. It chronicles these events in a connected narrative, from the onset of the illness to reflections in the years after the death. The book is, most of all, a series of acts of understanding. The poems are impelled by a passion to know and a freedom to follow wherever the truth may seem to lead. The book goes into areas of feeling and experience rarely entered in poetry. The ebullient language, the show more startling, far-reaching images, the sense of extraordinary connectedness seize us immediately. Sharon Olds transforms a harsh reality with truthfulness, with beauty, with humor--and without bitterness. The deep pain in The Father arises from a death, and from understanding a life. But there is joy as well. In the end, we discover we have been reading not a grim accounting but an inspiriting tragedy, transcending the personal. The radiance and daring that have always distinguished Sharon Olds' work find here their most powerful expression. show lessTags
Recommendations
Member Reviews
A friend recommended Sharon Olds to me after we had a conversation about Neruda, Bukowski, and various favorite poets. I'm a tough judge of poetry - but Olds had me literally crying. The subject - her father/father figures - is relatable, as are the subtopics of mortality and intimacy. If you want to be messed up for a few days, read this collection. I tore through it and was both devastated and feeling incredibly alive by the end of it. It is both beautiful and agonizing.
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Poetry volumes by single author
121 works; 8 members
Author Information
39+ Works 3,781 Members
Sharon Olds was born in San Francisco. She lives in New York City.
Awards and Honors
Common Knowledge
- Original publication date
- 1992
Classifications
Statistics
- Members
- 272
- Popularity
- 118,440
- Reviews
- 1
- Rating
- (3.87)
- Languages
- English, Spanish
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 7
- ASINs
- 1
