I Was Bonnie and Clyde - by Laura Kasischke (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

As technology and consumerism inch to the forefront of society, I Was Bonnie and Clyde illuminates small collisions between life and death.

In Laura Kasischke's new collection, every moment contains an infinity: the mundane in the monumental, and the monumental in the mundane. As technology and consumerism inch to the forefront of society, I Was Bonnie and Clyde illuminates small collisions between life and death, from "The worm in the grave of JFK" to "the mole hauled out of the ground / by the dog to die in the sun." Ghosts, both real and imagined, haunt and heighten these poems. Calling upon the weariness of Peter Rabbit, the poetry of Bonnie Parker, and the electrocution of Topsy the elephant, Kasischke evokes history and tragedy with a quiet, conversational reverence. Through their repetitions, their exclamations, and their laments, these poems serve as both mirror and reflection, reaching out as the reader gazes in.

Review Quotes

Praise for Laura Kasischke

"Kasischke deposits us here at the foot of a perpetuity, making an eternity of the smallest scale (nail biting)."--Chiara Bercu, ZYZZYVA

"Maybe it doesn't take a visionary to merge a funeral with Deep Purple, or to combine realism with myth, but this poet is deeply smart in a way that isn't often articulated in the world and her fusions and images can add up to revelation."--Gale Renee Walden, Brooklyn Rail

"This is a collection of masterful poems that are honest about the experience of being a person while posing urgent philosophical questions and answering them through the act of art that chimes and throws sparks."--Jennifer Michael Hecht, American Poets

"Kasischke's latest collection, tight with her distinguishing concision and strong lyricism, continues to invent and explore new terrains."--Ellen Duffer, Ploughshares

"For Kasischke and for Glück both, poetry is a kind of revenge on the existential limits that it describes."--Stephanie Burt, Los Angeles Review of Books

"Kasischke astonishes with her lyricism and metaphorical power."--Publishers Weekly

"The future will not--should not--see us by one poet alone. But if there is any justice in that future, Kasischke is one of the poets it will choose."--Stephanie Burt, Boston Review

"Kasischke's poems are powered by a skillful use of imagery and the subtle, ingenious way she turns a phrase."--Austin American-Statesman

"Every poem is exquisitely crafted, with crisp, clean lines and imagery that dazzles."--Elizabeth Lund, Washington Post

About the Author

Raised in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and currently living in Chelsea, Michigan with her son, Laura Kasischke is the author of eleven collections of poetry and nine novels. Among them Space, in Chains (2011) won the National Book Critics Circle award, while Where Now: New and Selected (2017) was longlisted for the National Book Award. Kasischke is the Theodore Roethke Distinguished Professor of English Language & Literature at the University of Michigan, and has received many honors for her works, including the Juniper Prize, multiple Pushcart Prizes, and the Rilke Poetry Prize. She has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation. Known for her narrative prowess, in both her poetry collections and in her novels, Kasischke's novels The Life Before Her Eyes, Suspicious River, and Be Mine have been adapted for film. Kasischke's titles have been widely translated, and are particularly well-received in France.