Volume 30, Number 10 · June 16, 1983
The Right Stuff
By Robert Mazzocco
From the First Nine: Poems 1946-1976
by James Merrill
Atheneum, 362 pp., $20.00; $10.95 (paper)
The Changing Light at Sandover "Mirabell's Books of Number," "Scripts for the Pageant," and a new coda, "The Higher Keys"
including the whole of the trilogy: "The Book of Ephraim,", by James Merrill
Atheneum, 560 pp., $25.00; $12.95 (paper)
With the publication now of From the First Nine and The Changing Light at Sandover, one can better trace James Merrill's development over the last thirty years, from the voyages and tours of the 'international theme' in his earlier poems through the supernatural forays of the trilogy—always bearing in mind that in the dandified body of this poet's works there lurks a giant's strength, a giant, of course, with consummate tact and balance.
Review, 6210 words
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