As Long As It's Big: A Narrative Poem (Johns Hopkins: Poetry and Fiction)

By John T. Irwin, John Bricuth, Cleo Qian

O for a muse of napalm... Years in the making, As Long As It's Big is a stunning and unique poetic achievement. By turns rollicking, funny, and deeply moving, this dramatic poem tells a tragic story - the collapse of a marriage after the suicide of a child - within the topsy-turvy venue of a divorce court ruled by an alternately cynical and sentimental judge. John Bricuth cleanly balances sensitive portrayals of painful lives with hilarity, chaos, and occasionally ribald caricatures. Hugely entertaining and immensely readable, Bricuth's verse narrative will absorb anyone seeking to unravel the truths of modern family life.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0801882451
• ISBN13: 9780801882456
• Release Date: October 2005
• Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
• Length: 232 Pages
• Weight: 0.90 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.0" x 0.9" x 5.8"

Customer Reviews

don't have to be a poetry fan

this book reads like a novelette and the fact that it's written as verse distracts not at all form the narrative offers wonderful insights into love, marriage, sexuality, life

Big In So Many Ways

After listening to John Bricuth's reading from As Long As It's Big for the St. Louis Writers Guild, I was impressed and purchased his book. However, I must confess, I was a little daunted by the cover description: "A Narrative Poem," which implies a long poem. I recalled Mr. Bricuth telling us it was written in blank verse (not the free verse I'm accustomed to), and I thought, Gee, am I qualified to read this? I hadn't actually read a long narrative poem since college and that was, yikes, more than thirty years ago. After the first page or so, however, I was absorbed. Now, after having finished the book, the form fascinates me, primarily because of Bricuth's brilliant mastery of it. He made it easy and natural to read, almost like listening to my own heartbeat, quickly, in tempo with my life and all of those around me. Reading in rhythm with the rhyme is of course the intended effect but how few of us can write in such rhythmic rhyme? Bricuth's pacing and the juxtaposition of tragic verse and humor work exceptionally well. I'm amazed with As Long As It's Big, how its three-line blank verse is so skillfully crafted and beautifully written, especially since it is a 217-page (long) narrative poem. One of my favorite passages is, "Looking back, realizing most of / What they'd gotten simply served to give / Times liquid moments weight, some space where life's / Bright foam could pool and linger in a thing, / Not run away like moonlight through your fingers...." As throughout the book, it matches the imagery with the character's emotions perfectly. This fine poem will remain on my shelf as a mainstay of brilliant writing to encourage others to read, to read again, and to select passages for inspiration. Jeff May www.askwritefish.com As with all my writing, if you don't agree you can always feed it to the fish.