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3.76 AVERAGE
3.76 AVERAGE
dark
emotional
reflective
fast-paced
dark
emotional
reflective
fast-paced
reflective
medium-paced
Ecstasy is a perfect example of my problems with modern poetry. This could have been a post on Tumblr.com. The language is too casual, the stories repetitive, the sensory nonexistent, flattening this book of poems into nothing more than a self-pitying diary. The author’s insistence on crowning himself A Real Poet every other line made me roll my eyes. When I wasn’t rolling my eyes, I was scoffing. The only redeemable part of this was “Today I Love Being Alive,” but then it was immediately followed by a horrendous poem called “Soul-Fuck.”
I will say, this author writes with a wonderful starkness. He can clearly write, maybe his other collections are better. I don’t think I’ll read them though.
Lastly, I listened to this on audiobook. The poet read it himself and he sounded so bored and disinterested, which also didn’t help to stir up any emotion in me other than a similar boredom and disinterest.
Bring back rhythmmmmmmmmm and heightened language gahhhhhhhh
I will say, this author writes with a wonderful starkness. He can clearly write, maybe his other collections are better. I don’t think I’ll read them though.
Lastly, I listened to this on audiobook. The poet read it himself and he sounded so bored and disinterested, which also didn’t help to stir up any emotion in me other than a similar boredom and disinterest.
Bring back rhythmmmmmmmmm and heightened language gahhhhhhhh
funny
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
Major thanks to Knopf for sending me an ARC of this in exchange for my honest thoughts:
“𝘞𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘭𝘪𝘧𝘦 𝘩𝘢𝘴 𝘧𝘦𝘭𝘵 𝘱𝘰𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘣𝘭𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘺𝘰𝘶?”
To be gay and bored and unsure of the world. What should life provide? What do I provide to life? Is God real through any of this? My Catholic upbringing says otherwise, but Dimitrov’s trust in the divine in that Lana Del Rey cool brings him to Frank O’Hara cool, a beatnik chic that once was, revived. Corvettes, Coca Colas, having a coke with you, can it be done?
The book is filled with boys and kisses and booze and charm. Dimitrov writes of a world where bumming off a cigarette from a cute face is life’s greatest pleasure, and pure ecstasy when you go home with them.
“𝘞𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘭𝘪𝘧𝘦 𝘩𝘢𝘴 𝘧𝘦𝘭𝘵 𝘱𝘰𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘣𝘭𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘺𝘰𝘶?”
To be gay and bored and unsure of the world. What should life provide? What do I provide to life? Is God real through any of this? My Catholic upbringing says otherwise, but Dimitrov’s trust in the divine in that Lana Del Rey cool brings him to Frank O’Hara cool, a beatnik chic that once was, revived. Corvettes, Coca Colas, having a coke with you, can it be done?
The book is filled with boys and kisses and booze and charm. Dimitrov writes of a world where bumming off a cigarette from a cute face is life’s greatest pleasure, and pure ecstasy when you go home with them.
Thanks to NetGalley and Knopf for the ARC!
For better or worse, Alex Dimitrov’s Ecstasy reads like an addendum to his earlier (and wonderful) work, Love and Other Poems, and interested readers might benefit more from simply revisiting that collection.
As always, Dimitrov’s voice is an absolute pleasure to read. It’s musical and playful without ever feeling twee, and he articulates a kind of gentle hedonism that suits the subject matter well. That said, the organizing theme of “ecstasy” just doesn’t seem capable of sustaining the collection.
Within the speaker’s world, ecstasy isn’t the euphoric release readers might expect. Instead, it’s a momentary pinch of something both listless and lonely. It’s recognition of transcendent potential without its attainment. For the first few poems, this definition seems to suggest an interrogation of how we elevate certain experiences, but it quickly becomes clear that the concept is too vague to really be a theme.
After a while, the poems begin to bleed together into shapeless recollections of substance-fueled hookups with arbitrary religious iconography thrown in for good measure. When the speaker describes doing a line of coke off of a crucifix, it feels less like a comment on parallels between drugs and religion and more like an outmoded attempt at provocation. Eventually, all the poems accumulate without forming any shape. One could argue that the poet’s intent is to deliberately withhold catharsis—that ecstasy is defined by its impossibility—but it reads more like an editor just realized there were finally enough pieces to fill a book.
Despite these criticisms, Dimitrov remains a formidable poet, and individual poems are simply a delight. “Monday” and “1995” are particular standouts, and I wish I had found them without the baggage of the surrounding collection. For readers who want to check out Ecstasy, it may be more rewarding to simply flip through it rather than approach it as body of work.
For better or worse, Alex Dimitrov’s Ecstasy reads like an addendum to his earlier (and wonderful) work, Love and Other Poems, and interested readers might benefit more from simply revisiting that collection.
As always, Dimitrov’s voice is an absolute pleasure to read. It’s musical and playful without ever feeling twee, and he articulates a kind of gentle hedonism that suits the subject matter well. That said, the organizing theme of “ecstasy” just doesn’t seem capable of sustaining the collection.
Within the speaker’s world, ecstasy isn’t the euphoric release readers might expect. Instead, it’s a momentary pinch of something both listless and lonely. It’s recognition of transcendent potential without its attainment. For the first few poems, this definition seems to suggest an interrogation of how we elevate certain experiences, but it quickly becomes clear that the concept is too vague to really be a theme.
After a while, the poems begin to bleed together into shapeless recollections of substance-fueled hookups with arbitrary religious iconography thrown in for good measure. When the speaker describes doing a line of coke off of a crucifix, it feels less like a comment on parallels between drugs and religion and more like an outmoded attempt at provocation. Eventually, all the poems accumulate without forming any shape. One could argue that the poet’s intent is to deliberately withhold catharsis—that ecstasy is defined by its impossibility—but it reads more like an editor just realized there were finally enough pieces to fill a book.
Despite these criticisms, Dimitrov remains a formidable poet, and individual poems are simply a delight. “Monday” and “1995” are particular standouts, and I wish I had found them without the baggage of the surrounding collection. For readers who want to check out Ecstasy, it may be more rewarding to simply flip through it rather than approach it as body of work.