To Scorch or Freeze : Poems about the Sacred (Phoenix Poets Series)

From Publishers Weekly
The author of some 15 volumes of poetry, Davie does not abandon intellectual force in order to espouse his religious convictions. However, he struggles here with his own rhetorical power and eloquence. The result is often strained and tiresome in these poems, which rely on the 16th century tradition of imitating the Psalms of David for their brief lyrical moments, and on the doctrines of the Christian Church for their content. Davie attempts a reconciliation between the evangelist irrationality he satirizes in earlier poems and his own deeply felt religious faith. Yet the personal voice is painfully self-conscious, especially when Davie condemns his own practice of ironic distancing: "Lover of the mephitic, / of fog and stink, / his natural haunt the road by the chemicals plant, / his elegant strong suit / is tacit and total carnage: / the Devil's Work, whose mark / (frivolity and distraction) / is on this page also / as on the best we can do." So, too, when he points to his poetic limits: "Hear my prayer, O Lord, / and please to consider my calling: / it commits me to squawking / and running off at the mouth." Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
This lively book by the editor of the New Oxford Book of Christian Verse ( LJ 5/15/82) offers not vague "devotional verse" but vigorous, well-wrought poetry in the tradition of Eliot. Davie speculates on philosophical and religious themes for our times, using the Psalms as his base; and like the Psalms his poems are full of both question and declaration. While sometimes the results are hilarious"Praise the Lord upon the harp,/ sing to him on the damnable steel guitar"Davie casts a cold eye on many modern preoccupations: "There is not the psychiatrist's truth,/then the poet's;/ the white man's truth, then the black's./ The Lord admits diversity of gifts,/ but not disparity." Essential for collections of modern religious poetry. Kathleen Norris, Lemmon P.L., S.D.Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.


Book Description
Here Davie, a writer attuned to both the changes of the modern world and a living literary tradition, turns to the lapsed poetic practice of translation and imitation of the Psalms of David. The result is a series of poems that speak powerfully of moral indignation and spiritual discovery within the complex of modernity.

"Few modern poets have managed to achieve Donald Davie's sense of human worth."--Times Higher Educational Supplement




About the Author
Donald Davie, professor emeritus at Vanderbilt University, resides in Devon, England. He is the author of many respected critical works and volumes of poetry. His collected poems have been published in two volumes, in 1972 and in 1984.





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In some 15v. of poetry, Davie has established himself as one of the most distinctive and impassioned voices of his generation. Here Davie has produced a collection of poems concerned with his own religious faith. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)


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