Good Poems

I bought the print edition a year ago and have read and re-read it many times – so that’s an A+ The best collection of accessible poems on the market in my mind (Garrison has three – all fantastic). My problem came when I purchased the Kindle version for my new Kindle Oasis so I could take with while traveliing. The kindle version of this volume is a travesty: you can’t find the poems! The Table of Contents only points to the broad sections. And the Index of poems and the author Index do not show page numbers or document locations and contain no hyperlinks. Such sloppy conversion – negligent. When I figure out how to get a refund, I will ask for one. BTW, there is no excuse – I bought one of the other Anthologies of Garrison Keillor’s as an Apple Bookstore volume and they have hyprliinks that work. Kindle, step up your game!

This is a wonderful collection which I own in hardback. I love it so much I purchased the E-Book as well.
UNFORTUNATELY I am extremely disappointed in the E-Book. It does not have a FULL TABLE OF CONTENTS. It only has section headings which make it impossible to browse poems or poets and read individual poems. This defect IMO makes the ebook useless and I have returned it for a refund.

I should also point out that the companion book – Good Poems for Hard Times does not have this defect. Each poem is listed by name in it’s Table of Contents, but does not include the poet name as part of that entry.

What a trove this book is. You might think “What does humorist Garrison Keillor know about poetry?” Quite a lot, it turns out. This is a wonderful anthology of poetry especially for anyone discovering poetry for the first time or rediscovering poetry after a bad high school English experience. Most of the poems in this volume are quite accessible.

Keillor chose his poems from the past as well as the present but with the selections skewed more toward contemporary poets. I found many gems: all the poems by Raymond Carver and Charles Bukowski are oustanding, “Poem to be Read at 3 A.M.” by Donald Justice, “He Wishes for the Clothes of Heaven” by Yeats, “Sonnet XLIII” by Millay, “The Music One Looks Back On” by Stephen Dobyns, and “Bison Crossing Near Mt. Rushmore” by May Swenson are some of my very favorites in this thick volume. I read only a few poems at a time, so this book took me more than 5 months to read.

As with any anthology, I found a few poems I didn’t like: “Piano” by D.H. Lawrence, “Sweater Weather” by Sharon Bryan, “Year’s End” by Richard Wilbur, and “Lazy” by David Lee were among the few poems I thought were bad. And I’m still struggling to like anything by Dickinson. Keillor includes several of her poems.

There are a couple of minor miscues in the book. For some reason, Keillor left out biographies for Robert Kinsley and H. W. Longfellow. And one poem – “Sir Patrick Spens” – was much shorter in “Good Poems” than it is in another volume of poetry that I have. This makes me question the editing of other poems in the volume.

I can highly recommend this book of poems. There is something in it for all readers of poetry. Be sure to read the bios as you go; they provide useful back story to what you are reading.

One word of caution: the Kindle version of this book is terrible. Don’t waste your money; be sure to read a paper copy.

As a long-time listener to Garrison Keillor’s show and his noon radio bits on poetry, I am tardy in adding these books to my collection, but it is just fine. Such a good introduction to poems and poets.

For years I have kept a hardcover copy in my car, and instead of listening to the radio on the way to work I would begin by opening the book at random and reading a poem before I left the driveway. Then I would think about the poem on the twenty-minute drive to work. Now I also have it on my iPad. Although there are many great poems that are not in this book, all the poems are very good.

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