Albert Goldbarth

Acclaimed for its dense, expansive form and linguistic energy, Albert Goldbarth’s poetry covers everything from historical and scientific concerns to private and ordinary matters. His numerous, highly-regarded collections are often filled with long poems which range in style from playful and conversational to serious and philosophical. Goldbarth’s unique style is a mix of complex ideas and detailed descriptions woven together with verbal play and often juxtaposed with dissimilar objects and facts. Goldbarth “has that rare gift of seeing metaphor in almost any event, of discovering a poem in the most unlikely places,” described Robert Cording in the Carolina Quarterly,adding, “Goldbarth’s poems…yoke disparate conceits, and [are] almost always fearlessly playful in their approach…It’s too easy to forget that for all of Goldbarth’s bravura, the poems’ punch lies in the way they affect us: over and over they tenderly remind us of the conditions of our humanness.” Eric McHenry, writing for Slate, noted that Goldbarth distinguishes himself from nearly all his contemporaries by writing in a style that is “effusive, sprawling, and instantly recognizable—an aesthetic that might best be characterized as “Why use one word when four will work just as well?” His poems do lack concentration in the most obvious sense of the word, but they make up for it with the other kind. Goldbarth pays rapt attention to the world around him, drawing one memorable connection after another.”