Owls and Other Fantasies: Poems and Essays

by Mary Oliver

Book Overview

A perfect introduction to Mary Oliver's poetry, this stunning collection features 26 nature poems and prose writings about the birds that played such an important role in the Pulitzer Prize winner's life.

Within these pages you will find hawks, hummingbirds, and herons; kingfishers, catbirds, and crows; swans, swallows and, of course, the snowy owl, among a dozen others-including ten poems that have never before been collected. She...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0807068756
• ISBN13: 9780807068755
• Release Date: April 2006
• Publisher: Beacon Press
• Length: 88 Pages
• Weight: 0.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.3" x 6.2" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

Great read

This is a great read. I had just heard of Mary's work and ordered quite few of her books. They are all wonderful. She has such a wonderful way to look at nature and the world in general.

Beautiful and touching.

As always, Mary Oliver does not disappoint. She is my favorite living poet. Her observations of nature and her beautiful way of expressing them touch something deep inside.

Lovely Poetry

I just discovered Mary Oliver. What a beautiful anthology of poems and essays. I especially enjoyed her reflections on owls. Highly recommended.

Great gift!

I purchased this book for a birder friend that never reads poetry and she absolutely loves the book! The book is filled with the sights, sounds, and imagery of nature (in both essay and poetry) as only Mary Oliver can breathe them into life through uncomplicated words and a genuine love of all things.

Birds along the path to heaven.

Pulitzer-Prize winning poet, Mary Oliver, demonstrates that in a world of "leaves and feathers, and comfort, and instruction" (p. 3), paying attention "is our endless and proper work" (p. 27). With a poet's gift of observation, and a naturalist's eye for detail, Oliver devotes this collection of verse almost entirely to birds. Just as the recent documentary, WINGED MIGRATION, captured the truly amazing nature of birds on film, Oliver captures the fascinating beauty of birds in verse. She compares goldfinches to "fragile bells" reminding us to bow our heads and say a prayer (p. 7), herons in a frozen marsh to "blue smoke" (p. 24), little wrens to "blue sailors" (p. 46), herons on a leafy bank to a "blue preacher" and "an old Chinese poet" (p. 48), an owl to "an angel, or a buddha with wings" (p. 54), starlings to "acrobats in the freezing wind" (p. 56), and an unknown bird that has left a egg to "a tree angel, perhaps, or a ghost of holiness" (p. 60). For Oliver, "the path to heaven doesn't lie down in flat miles," it's in "the imagination with which you perceive the world" (p. 11).G. Merritt