Sad Little Breathing Machine

by Matthea Harvey

Harvey, whose debut collection was praised by the New Yorker
as "intensely visual, mournfully comic and syntactically
inventive," offers her second stunning collection

Units are the engines
I understand best.

One betrayal, two.
Merrily, merrily, merrily.
-from "Introduction to the World"

In Sad Little Breathing Machine, Matthea Harvey explores the strange and intricate...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1555973965
• ISBN13: 9781555973964
• Release Date: March 2004
• Publisher: Graywolf Press
• Length: 79 Pages
• Weight: 0.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.3" x 6.2" x 8.7"

Customer Reviews

Fresh & Unusual

(Matthea Harvey read as part of the Writer's Voice Visiting Authors Series at the West Side YMCA on 8 December 2006. This was my introduction): Matthea's Harvey's poetry is like going to a foreign country, and not knowing the language. Perhaps you stay a while. Eventually, words and phrases which pulled tantalizingly away from you at first, their sounds striking and bold, evocative and possessing an almost subconscious power, begin to coalesce. Then, still with the breathtaking mystery of staying in a strange place, you may find you are able to gain some small entry into its true essence, while still maintaining the sense of wonder at something truly different. Matthea Harvey's poetry rewards the effort, involvement and attention of the reader. Her language is fresh and unusual in the best sense--without contrivance or petty literary gamesmanship. She has the ability to stimulate the reader's mind, and to suddenly swoop in, hit directly in the gut by creating shocking, unpredictable connections. The work is alive and moving on the page, vibrant, ever-opening, capable of astonishing power and emotional force, while never being melodramatic--the exactitude of Matthea's language will not allow it--and of course, the work remains stunningly original.

basically this book rocks

I think Harvey has done the impossible: written a very good sophmore effort. Funny and smart, the way poetry should read out of the academic efforts of current young writers.

what a masterpiece

This book is wonderful -- clever, sincere, brilliant, hilarious, and heartfelt. Ms. Harvey's poetic world is populated by strange and amazing creatures (the 1st person; the cake-like baby; the lovely, cold princesses) that draw the reader in and make us wish the book would never end...

I'm in love

Funny, witty, clever, short and knife through the heart good.

A treasure

I had never heard of Matthea Harvey when I picked up her book and flipped through it. But it didn't matter whether I heard her name before or not, her poems grabbed me by the cheeks and slammed my face into the pages. I instantly fell hard for this book and bought it on the spot. I love her style. She's fresh and smart. This is a happy book of poems that makes me laugh in full-fledged giddiness and awe at such wit, such brilliance. Matthea is like a slurpee with a hot pink bendy straw, and I mean that in the best sense of the word. Ahhh! Refreshing and uplifting. My new favorite poet. My favorite part? The first two lines of "Introduction to a Diction:" Galoshless. I / stood by the river, all ashiver. Gosh I was hoping for liver.