Song and Dance

by Alan Shapiro

Book Overview

The poems in Alan Shapiro's seventh collection, Song and Dance, intimately describe the complicated feelings that attend the catastrophic loss of a loved one. In 1998, Shapiro's brother, David, an actor on Broadway, was diagnosed with an incurable form of brain cancer. Song and Dance recounts the poet's emotional journey through the last months of his brother's life, exploring feelings too often ignored in official accounts of grief: horror, relief,...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0618382291
• ISBN13: 9780618382293
• Release Date: February 2004
• Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
• Length: 59 Pages
• Weight: 0.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.2" x 6.3" x 8.6"

Customer Reviews

An Astonishing Book

Shapiro writes of his brother, a performer who recently died at a young age, and he makes use of personal memories and show business songs in ironic and unexpected ways. This is not a collection of poetry in the usual sense; it accumulates power in the manner of a novel while having the precise beauty of poetry. If there is any justice, it will be a finalist for all of the prizes. Alan Shapiro is a fine poet, but the appeal of this book goes far beyond the typical readership of poetry. This is a book that will speak to anyone who loves literature, but also to anyone who had suffered grief. It is an unsentimental celebration of that which endures after a tragedy.