The Book of Light: Anniversary Edition

by Lucille Clifton

Book Overview

With a powerful introduction by Ross Gay and a moving afterword by Sidney Clifton, this special anniversary edition of The Book of Light offers new meditations and insights on one of the most beloved voices of the 20th century.Though The Book of Light opens with thirty-nine names for light, we soon learn the most meaningful name is Lucille--daughter, mother, proud Black woman. Known for her ability to convey multitudes...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1556596782
• ISBN13: 9781556596780
• Release Date: August 2023
• Publisher: Copper Canyon Press
• Length: 96 Pages
• Weight: 0.65 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 6.0" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

Highly recommended

It's hard to believe what Lucille Clifton can do with a handful of lines of poetry. She is our modern-day Emily Dickinson and despite all the praise that she's received over her career, it's not nearly enough. In her best work -- which is most of her work -- it's as if her intelligence cracks open a hole in the sky, a revelation that approaches religious experience. Book of Light is to my mind her very best book. It includes poem cycles based on both classical pagan mythology and judeo-christian scriptures, most notably a fabulous monologue in which Satan addresses God -- the best and most interesting use of Satan in English poetry since John Milton.

Delightful Collection

Lucille Clifton's Book of Light manages to convey some of the joy of the author. The poems are simple but their message is not. A wonderful book to serve as an introduction to one of American's premiere poets.

A beautiful, heartfelt, heart-full collection of poetry...

I was fortunate enough to hear Ms. Clifton read from this and other works at a small reading in Southern Maryland a few summers back...her rich, resonant voice was the pefect accompaniment to her heartfelt-yet-spare language. In the "Clark Kent" series of poems in this collection, she slays the reader in a single line that cuts through the pretty prose one might find in another poet's work, arriving at the heart of disappointed love ("the question for you is/what have you ever traveled toward/more than your own safety?). In another favorite, "still there is mercy, there is grace," she celebrates the quiet, filling grace of god (how otherwise/could i, a sleek old/traveler/curl one day safe and still/ beside You/at Your feet, perhaps/but, amen, Yours) From love to God---and maybe the two, of course, aren't at such a distance---to everything in between, Ms. Clifton captures what it is to be, to feel, to connect with others...and while some of her poetry also beautifully and mystically celebrates and mourns the experiences of African Americans, her voice is too universal, in my opinion, to categorize; there wasn't a word in this collection that failed to cross over color and burrow itself right into the heart of the whole color spectrum of human experience. If you can hear her read, don't miss it, but if you can't, her voice will sing through from the pages with clarity and grace.