[Gilbert Sorrentino's] work takes in the form and tradition of such writers as Rakosi, Bronk and, in emotive stance, Bly.

His diction is terse but not sparse [in The Orangery] and he has the observant knowledge of the authoritarian poet, and the ability to expand simple action or sight into a vast panorama of feeling and pathos, much of it implied, and here lies the skill.

No light verse, the work needs concentrated reading, which is what English poetry readers lack. It is time such extraterritorial offerings were accepted.

Martin Booth, "The Dated, the Demanding, the Daunting," in Tribune (reprinted by permission of Tribune, London), Vol. 43, No. 23, June 8, 1979, p. 7.∗