A Year of Last Things: Poems (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9780593801567)

From one of the most influential writers of his generation, a gorgeously surprising poetry collection about memory, history, and the act of looking back

Following several of his internationally acclaimed novels, A Year of Last Things is Michael Ondaatje's long-awaited return to poetry. In pieces that are sometimes witty, sometimes moving, and always wise, we journey back through time by way of alchemical leaps, unearthing writings by revered masters, moments of shared tenderness, and the abandoned landscapes we hold on to to rediscover the influence of every border crossed.

Moving from a Sri Lankan boarding school to Moli鑽e's chair during his last stage performance, to Bulgarian churches and their icons, to the California coast and his beloved Canadian rivers, Michael Ondaatje casts a brilliant eye that merges memory with the present, in the way memory as the distant shores of art and lost friends continue to influence everything that surrounds him.

From his poem "His chair, a narrow bed, a motel room, the fox"
At the Hacienda Motel in Los Angeles Sam Cooke was shot dead.
'See that shadow on the wall . . .' All those motels and hotels
in literature and song, where X wrote this,
where Y got drunk, where Z overdosed.
The one Hank Williams was driven past, dead already in his car.
The Slavianski Bazaar Hotel in "The Lady with a Dog,"
where Dmitri imagines their dark but hopeful future.
The Hel de ville de Courtrai, where Verlaine shot Rimbaud.
The Casa Verdi in Milan, where retired opera singers were welcomed
along with various heteronyms of Fernando Pessoa in their afterlife.

Author: Michael Ondaatje
ISBN-10: 0593801563
ISBN-13: 9780593801567
Publisher: Knopf Publishing Group
Language: English
Published: 03/19/2024
Pages: 128
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 0.60lbs
Size: 8.50h x 5.90w x 0.80d

Review Citation(s):
Publishers Weekly 01/15/2024
Library Journal 02/01/2024 pg. 78
Shelf Awareness 03/22/2024
BookPage 03/01/2024