The Traveler's Vade Mecum: A Poetry Anthology
(Paperback)
Publishing Details
The Traveler's Vade Mecum: A Poetry Anthology
By (Author) Helen Klein Ross
Red Hen Press
Red Hen Press
15th June 2017
United States
Classifications
General
Non Fiction
Poetry
811.608
Physical Properties
Paperback
96
Width 152mm, Height 228mm
Description
The original Traveler's Vade Mecum, published in 1853, contained thousands of telegrams. Ross chose telegrams as titles for poems solicited from dozens of poets, including Bollingen Prize winner Frank Bidart and former US Poet Laureate Billy Collins to create a digital-age compendium of old-world poetics. Here are lyric poems, language poems, prose poems, found poems, haikus, pantoums, ekphrases, epistolary poems, acrostics, sonnets and mirror sonnets. Demonstrating the range of what poetry can do, this book provides a fascinating glimpse into the habits and social aspects of 19th century America--and shows how we have evolved 163 years later.
Reviews
"Essential reading for poetry lovers and experimenters, The Travelers's Vade Mecum dramatically and wittily expands the notion of the literary prompt."
--Billy Collins, United States Poet Laureate
"Helen Klein Ross connects poets of today to a clever telegraphic idea from yesterday, and in doing so re-introduces readers to A. C. Baldwin, a 19th century consumer advocate whose vision and persistence impacted the world in unexpected ways."
--Ralph Nader, Father of modern American consumer movement, author, Founder of American Museum of Tort Law
"In an inspired rediscovery of A. C. Baldwin's The Traveler's Vade Mecum, Helen Klein Ross and her poets have magically transformed an obscure 19th century invention into lyrical gold."
--Arthur Molella, Director Emeritus, Smithsonian National Museum of American History
Author Bio
Helen Klein Rosss poetry, essays and fiction have appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times , The Los Angeles Times and in The Iowa Review where it won the 2014 Iowa Review award in poetry. Her second novel, What Was Mine from Simon & Schuster/Gallery Books was star-reviewed and debuted on January 5, 2016. It sold out on Amazon before 8 AM and was chosen by People magazine as a "Best New Book of 2016." Helen graduated from Cornell University and received an MFA from The New School. She lives with her husband in New York City and Salisbury, Connecticut.
