Vermeer in Hell
Michael White
Winner of the 2013 Lexi Rudnitsky Editor's Choice Award
Through the paintings of Vermeer, Michael White explores new landscapes and transforms familiar ones in this extraordinary new collection of poems. This captivating masterwork transports us across eras and continents, from Confederate lynchings to the bombing of Dresden, through its lyrical inhabitations of some of Vermeer’s most revered paintings, each one magically described and renewed. More than mere ekphrasis, Michael White explores the transformative possibilities of great art in his fourth collection.
“White translates his passion for Dutch painting into dynamic, striking poems. A book not to be missed.”—Library Journal (starred review)
“Vermeer in Hell is Michael White’s museum of ghosts and shades, of narratives woven masterfully out of the personal and historical alike—out of the lived, the envisioned, the loved, and the terrible.... Out of Michael White’s vision, each poem achieves for us the delicacy and durability of Vermeer’s own art.”
—David Baker
“It is not an overstatement to call this poetry Genius.”—Laura Kasischke
“In these elegant, powerful poems, Michael White pays homage to a great painter while engaging social realities that affect us all. They are brave, beautiful poems linked by authentic vision and a sensitive, educated ear.”
—Sam Hamill
Michael White is the author of four collections of poetry and a memoir, Travels in Vermeer, and has published widely in respected periodicals, including The Paris Review, The New Republic, The Kenyon Review, Ploughshares, Western Humanities Review, and the Best American Poetry. White teaches poetry at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington.
Paperback / $15.95 (Can $17.00) / ISBN 978-0-89255-436-2 / 58 pages / Poetry