And the Stars Were Shining

by Ashbery, John

• ISBN13: 9780374105006
• ISBN10: 0374105006
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1994-02-01
• Publisher: Farrar Straus & Giroux

Summary

John Ashbery's sixteenth collection of poems, like all the others, strikes out into new territory and engages the reader in new and unexpected ways. With the exception of the title poem, which concludes the volume - a thirteen-part poem of exceptional grace and brilliance - the fifty-eight poems in this collection are mostly short; in their relative brevity they display all the valiant wit and rich lyric intensity which readers know from Ashbery's expansive longer work. The critic Harold Bloom has observed: "And the Stars Were Shining is one of John Ashbery's strongest collections, the title poem his most beautiful long poem yet. He helps to redeem a bad time when many among us have joined in a guilty flight away from the aesthetic."

Author Biography

John Ashbery teaches at Bard College.

Table of Contents

Token Resistance	p. 3
Spring Cries	p. 4
The Mandrill on the Turnpike	p. 5
About to Move	p. 6
Ghost Riders of the Moon	p. 8
The Love Scenes	p. 9
Just What's There	p. 10
Title Search	p. 12
Free Nail Polish	p. 13
Till the Bus Starts	p. 14
The Ridiculous Translator's Hopes	p. 16
The Story of Next Week	p. 17
A Hundred Albums	p. 18
A Waltz Dream	p. 20
Falls to the Floor, Comes to the Door	p. 21
The Lounge	p. 22
The Improvement	p. 23
"The Favor of a Reply	p. 24
A Held Thing	p. 25
Strange Things Happen at Night	p. 27
World's End	p. 28
Ice Cream in America	p. 29
Works on Paper I	p. 30
Local Time	p. 31
Well, Yes, Actually	p. 32
My Gold Chain	p. 34
Footfalls	p. 35
Weather and Turtles	p. 36
Sometimes in Places	p. 37
William Byrd	p. 38
Assertiveness Training	p. 40
Like a Sentence	p. 41
Two Pieces	p. 43
The Friendly City	p. 44
The Desperate Hours	p. 45
The Decline of the West	p. 46
The Archipelago	p. 47
Gummed Reinforcements	p. 49
Spotlight on America	p. 51
What do You Call it When	p. 52
Pleasure Boats	p. 54
Pretty Questions	p. 55
Pathless Wanderings	p. 57
On First Listening to Schreker's Der Schatzgraber	p. 58
Dinosaur Country	p. 60
Leeward	p. 62
Paraph	p. 63
Not Planning a Trip Back	p. 64
Myrtle	p. 65
Man in Lurex	p. 66
In the Meantime, Darling	p. 67
Just for Starters	p. 68
Bromeliads	p. 69
Commercial Break	p. 70
Sicilian Bird	p. 71
Mutt and Jeff	p. 72
Coventry	p. 74
And the Stars Were Shining	p. 76
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