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The Pill Versus the Springhill Mine Disaster Richard Brautigan 9780224619332 Books

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The Pill Versus the Springhill Mine Disaster Richard Brautigan 9780224619332 Books

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The Pill Versus the Springhill Mine Disaster Richard Brautigan 9780224619332 Books Reviews

At a time when the complexities of existence shape even our entertainment, our art, and our literature, it is refreshing to return to the world of Richard Brautigan, (1935 - 1984) a welfare child who reflected on his humble beginnings throughout the 1960s as the people's poet. His novels and his poems deal in beautiful simplicities, spare statements that express the ordinary daily events of life, capturing these moments with words so clear that they leave no opportunity for disagreement. His droll humor is at once amusing, tender, and touching.

This collection of 98 of his poems ranges from very brief `micropoems' to longer extended works. His short poems are simply blinks of a creative eye scanning the world

In a Café
I watched a man in a cafe fold a slice of bread
as if he were folding a birth certificate or looking
at the photograph of a dead lover.

Man
With his hat on
he's about five inches taller
than a taxicab.

But for many of us who fell in love with his language and observations of the obvious the following poem is one of his very finest;

My Nose Is Growing Old

Yup.
A long lazy September look
in the mirror
say it's true.

I'm 31
and my nose is growing
old.

It starts about 1/2
an inch
below the bridge
and strolls geriatrically
down
for another inch or so
stopping.

Fortunately, the rest
of the nose is comparatively
young.

I wonder if girls
will want me with an
old nose.

I can hear them now
the heartless bitches!

"He's cute
but his nose
is old."

This is little book is a treasure trove of memories of a simpler time, the work of a man who was the people's voice and whose life ended in the solitude of suicide. Highly recommended. Grady Harp, February 10
Thank you
Re-read after about 10 or 15 years -- probably more, actually. Some good poems, many not-so-good, but it's over quick and overall entertaining.
"The Pill Versus the Springhill Mine Disaster," by Richard Brautigan, is a collection of poems. Brautigan's style is often surreal, often tender, with touches of witty humor. The poems are written in a clear, straightforward free verse. Here is an example of his style (from "The Chinese Checker Players") "When I was six years old / I played Chinese checkers / with a woman / who was ninety-three years old."
Recurrent themes in the book include love, sex, loss, and loneliness. Incorporated throughout are an intriguing mix of pop and "high" culture references Jefferson Airplane, Ophelia, the New York Yankees, John Donne, etc. The book often has an earthy flavor; Brautigan writes about such topics as his own penis or the smell of a fart. Some particularly memorable poems include the following
"All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace," a science fiction vision of a "cybernetic meadow"; the open-ended "Karma Repair Kit Items 1-4"; "Discovery," a joyful poem about sexual intimacy; the surreal "The Pumpkin Tide"; the funny, haiku-like "November 3"; and "A Good-Talking Candle," which invites the reader into an altered state of perception.
Although most of the poems are very short, there is one longer poem the 9-part, 9-page "the Galilee Hitch-hiker," which chronicles the surreal adventures of Baudelaire (among other experiences, he opens an unconventional hamburger stand in San Francisco). If you only know Brautigan from his weird and wonderful novels, I recommend you read this remarkable collection of poems.
The Pill versus the Springhill Mine Disaster
I enjoyed reading this series of poems very much I have not read much poetry in the past. I spent a lifetime in engineering reading technical documents and non-fiction. However, in retirement, I have engaged on a project to read the literature which so many instructors tried to teach me in school. Brautigan was one of the authors taught to me in first year college. I suppose that the instructor saw Brautigan’s work as relevant to those of us who were young 40 and 50 years ago. I know I enjoyed the class. With my retirement project, I have found that there are many ways to write history than I had realized . Non-fiction is but one of them but there are many other ways to gain insight into human society and personal human psychology. Engineering is about creating things that are useful and that means having an understanding of human needs and wants. There are many ways to gain such an understanding. Poetry like this is one of those ways.

The poem that most affected me in the collection was “A Good-Talking Candle”—“I had a good-talking candle last night in my bedroom./ I was very tired but I wanted somebody to be with me, so I lit a candle/ and listened to its comfortable light until I was asleep.” There are a number of these very short poems in the collection. It is with these that, in my opinion, Brautigan is most effective. They are short one or two line lyrics or short stories. They do capture personal emotion. I found the longer poems to be uneven. Some like “All Watched Over By Machines Of Loving Grace” are very effective. Others, however, have obscure and rather precious imagery
I'm a huge fan of his work, he's one of the best authors that I've had the please to read. These series of short poems are great, I always take a book of his when I'm traveling because I know it's a quick read and I'll be able to sock up some rays and still have time to finish his works in one session )
nothing I could say would explain how much I love this volume of poetry.
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