Gerald Stern, in his foreword to Rose, describes Li-Young Lee's poetry as having "the large vision, the deep seriousness and the almost heroic ideal, reminiscent more of John Keats, Rainer Maria Rilk...
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Mitchell names "tenderness " as the most salient quality of Lee's poetry and judges this a shortcoming in Rose.
Rose, Li-Young Lee's first book, begins the career of a p...
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In the following review of The City in Which I Love You, Kitchen extols Lee's "verbal and visionary imagination."
Li-Young Lee's second book, The City in Which I Love Yo...
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In the following essay, Greenbaum offers a favorable evaluation of both Rose and The City in Which I Love You.
Sometimes poets seem like the orators at Speakers' Corner—I can see them...
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In the essay below, Zhou contends that "Li-Young Lee's poems enact and embody the processes of poetic innovation and identity invention beyond the boundaries of any single cultural herit...
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In the following review, Smock analyzes the style of Rose.
The first poem by Li-Young Lee I ever read, in The American Poetry Review, was called “The Gift,” about a father cutting a m...
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In the following review, Knowlton highlights the autobiographical significance of The City in Which I Love You.
The City in Which I Love You is the second book of poems by Li-Young Lee, an American...
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In the following excerpt, Waniek considers the autobiographical, historical, and emotional implications ofThe City in Which I Love You.
As I write, the troops of the Federation are crushing the Kli...
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In the following excerpt, McQuade describes the lyrical quality of The Winged Seed, underscoring its significance with respect to autobiography.
We don't remember the past in an inverted pyr...
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In the following essay, Engles explains the thematic significance of the words “persimmon” and “precision” in “Persimmons.”
Li-Young Lee's “P...
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In the following essay, Xiaojing examines the cross-cultural contexts and influences on Lee's poetry, extending his observations beyond the poet's ethnicity.
Li-Young Lee's two...
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In the following essay, Slowik compares and contrasts Lee's treatment of immigrant themes to those of Asian-American poets Garrett Hongo, Marilyn Chin, and David Mura, demonstrating the ways ea...
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In the following review, the critic focuses on questions of origins raised by Book of My Nights.
Passionate and profound, Lee's long-awaited third collection [Book of My Nights] charts the m...
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In the following review, Nobles assesses the themes and imagery of Rose.
Winner of the Delmore Schwartz Memorial Poetry Award, Li-Young Lee's first book, Rose, is an accomplishment and an in...
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In the following excerpt, Kitchen describes the themes and style of Rose, examining their relationship to the imagery.
When a poem raises a lump in the throat time after time, it must either be ter...
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In the following excerpt, Rector examines the lyrical structure and sense of character that mark Rose, comparing Lee's work to Rainer Maria Rilke's.
Much of the recent chatter about p...
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In the following excerpt, Mitchell defines the tenderness of Rose, deeming Lee a promising new poet.
Rose, Li-Young Lee's first book, begins the career of a promising poet. Lee is one of a r...
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In the following excerpt, Muske comments on the various literary traditions that inform The City in Which I Love You.
The 1990 Lamont Selection is The City in Which I Love You by Li-Young Lee, who ...
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In the following excerpt, Hamill discusses the themes, styles, and poetic forms of The City in Which I Love You, explicating Lee's meanings.
In the third book of The Dunciad, Alexander Pope ...
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In the following excerpt, Kitchen assesses the aural achievement of The City in Which I Love You, highlighting its themes, rhythms, and language.
Li-Young Lee's second book, The City in Whic...
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In the following excerpt, Baker assesses the representation of the “foreign” or “other” in The City in Which I Love You.
Li-Young Lee's second collection, The Cit...
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Li-Young Lee
Critical Essay by Roger Mitchell
