BiblioVault - Books about Clark, Patricia

Mentor and Muse

Essays from Poets to Poets

Edited by Blas Falconer, Beth Martinelli, and Helena Mesa

Southern Illinois University Press, 2010

In Mentor and Muse, a collection of twenty-nine insightful essays by some of today’s leading poetic minds, editors Blas Falconer, Beth Martinelli, and Helena Mesa have brought together an illuminating anthology that draws upon both established and emerging poets to create a one-of-a-kind resource and unlock the secrets of writing and revising poetry.
Gathered here are numerous experts eager to share their wisdom with other writers. Each author examines in detail a particular poetic element, shedding new light on the endless possibilities of poetic forms. Addressed within are such topics as the fluid possibilities of imagery in poetry; the duality of myth and the personal, and the power of one to unlock the other; the surprising versatility of traditional poetic forms; and the pleasure of collaboration with other poets. Also explored in depth are the formative roles of cultural identity and expectations, and their effect on composition; advice on how to develop one’s personal poetic style and approach; the importance of setting in reading and meaning; and the value of indirection in the lyric poem. Challenges to conventional concepts of beauty are examined through Shakespeare’s sonnets, and the ghost of Longfellow is called upon to guide students through the rewards and roadblocks of writing popular poetry. Poetic persona is demystified through Newton’s law of gravity, while the countless permutations of punctuation are revealed with analysis of e. e. cummings and W. S. Merwin.

The essays include the full text of the poems discussed, and detailed, relevant writing exercises that allow students the opportunity to directly implement the strategies they have learned. While many advanced topics such as authenticity, discordant music, and prosody are covered, this highly readable volume is as user-friendly as it is informative. Offering a variety of aesthetics and approaches to tackling the issues of composition, Mentor and Muse takes poets beyond the simple stages of poetic terms and strategies. These authorsinvite students to explore more advanced concepts, enabling them to draw on the traditions of the past while at the same time forging their own creative paths into the future.

Chosen as one of the "Best Books for Writers" by Poets & Writers magazine

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She Walks Into the Sea

Patricia Clark

Michigan State University Press, 2009

Patricia Clark's poems explore not only refuge but also wonder and appreciation, as well as astonishment.
     A number of the 56 poems collected here show her grappling with loss, especially the loss of her mother, though she isn't one to indulge in misery. Instead, she goes walking. It is the harp tree in "The Poplar Adrift" that Clark imagines giving voice to sorrow, thus sparing those who stroll by—"all the grief that passes" becoming, in the tree’s very fibers, sound on the air, a wind through branches and leaves.
     Clark also finds opportunities for learning, for meditation, and for contemplation. Octavio Paz has written, "Nature speaks as though it were a lover." In many of the poems collected here, Clark listens to nature speaking and revels in this lover, aiming to capture some of the qualities of Michigan's trees, birds, and landscapes in lyric poems.
     It is Clark's particular gift to give us "tasted" as she draws her readers into the world, inhabiting the worlds of nature, head, and heart.

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Sign Language Archaeology

Understanding the Historical Roots of American Sign Language

Ted Supalla

Gallaudet University Press, 2014

This engrossing study investigates the infancy of American Sign Language (ASL). Authors Ted Supalla and Patricia Clark highlight the major events in ASL history, revealing much of what has not been clearly understood until now. According to tradition, ASL evolved from French Sign Language. The authors analyze the metalinguistic assumptions of these early accounts and also examine in depth a key set of films made by the National Association of the Deaf (NAD) between 1910 and 1920. Designed by the NAD to preserve classic ASL, the films feature 15 sign masters, the model signers of that time. In viewing these films, the authors discovered that the sign masters signed differently depending on their age. These variations provide evidence about the word formation process of early ASL, further supported by data collected from dictionaries of the 19th and early 20th centuries.

By tracing the writings of selected individuals, this study reconstructs the historical context for early ASL grammar. It describes the language used in each century and how it changed, and focuses on the rediscovery of the literary legacy of the Deaf American voice. Sign Language Archaeology reveals the contrast between folk etymology and scientific etymology and allows readers to see ASL in terms of historical linguistics.

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Sunday Rising

Patricia Clark

Michigan State University Press, 2013

Wallace Stevens, in his poem “A Postcard from the Volcano,” writes, “left what we felt / at what we saw.” Patricia Clark’s stunning fourth poetry collection, Sunday Rising, is full of such moments, carefully wrought and mined for their resonance. Haunting human forms rise from the underworld, seeking to communicate, longing for connection. In language as resounding and evocative as the subjects it describes, Sunday Rising questions the past, human relationships, the meaning of loss, and the author’s own heritage. With landscapes as familiar as Michigan and as distant as the shores of Western Europe, these poems bring to light the cracks and fissures in our world, amid lyric exhalations rising like clouds above the birds, trees, and coastlines, language capturing the poet’s spiritual longing as well as moments of passion and sorrow. From the first poem to the last, an intimate relationship with the physical world emerges. Its teachings, consolations, utterances, and echoes comprise a sense of discovery. The ethereal and often spiritual practice of seeing and taking note is celebrated, whether this process yields gemstones or ore, or words wrought into the music and imagery of poetry.

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