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A few poems among Jeffers' lyrical best
Though most critical attention focuses on Jeffers' earlier and mid-career poems, in this last collection appear some of his strongest--and most inventive--elegies.The poem "Passenger Pigeons" may borrow some phrases from an earlier poem of his, and so reveal that he is running over old themes here, but in scope and power stands as one of his boldest condemnations of human progress.The title poem, "The Beginning and the End," gives readers another fine example of what critics have called his "dehumanizing" stance, that now-popular idea that people are not the center of it all.Perhaps none of these will be considered flawless poems--Jeffers has some habitual resolutions, a handful of uninteresting verbs and adjectives, a bitter tone at times.As a collection, however, these poems display more seriousness, invention, accessibility, and dexterity of line and subject than most contemporary collections.You won't find the mythological storylines or overbearing metaphors of poems like "Roan Stallion" and "The Tower Beyond Tragedy;" these are less calculated, freer poems.If for no other reason than to find an alternative model to his contemporaries, you would do well to read this book. ... Read more

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First performed in Athens, 431 B.C., this classic play is one of the most searingly intense of all Greek tragedies. Spurned by the husband whose life she saved, the celebrated sorceress of legend plans a terrible revenge on the man she had loved. In this remarkable translation, Seana McKenna portrayal of Medea is mesmerizing and breath-taking as it is cruel and heatless. ... Read more