Dearly: New Poems

by Margaret Atwood

The collection of a lifetime from the bestselling novelist and poet.

By turns moving, playful and wise, the poems gathered in Dearly are about absences and endings, ageing and retrospection, but also about gifts and renewals. They explore bodies and minds in transition, as well as the everyday objects and rituals that embed us in the present. Werewolves, sirens and dreams make their appearance, as do various forms of animal life and fragments of our damaged environment.

Before she became one of the world's most important and loved novelists, Atwood was a poet. Dearly is her first collection in over a decade. It brings together many of her most recognizable and celebrated themes, but distilled - from minutely perfect descriptions of the natural world to startlingly witty encounters with aliens, from pressing political issues to myth and legend. It is a pure Atwood delight, and long-term readers and new fans alike will treasure its insight, empathy and humour.

• ISBN10: 006303249X
• ISBN13: 9780063032491
• Publish Date: 10 November 2020
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
• Imprint: Collins
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 144
• Language: English

Reviews

[Kim Deister]

There is a very clear overall theme to this collection of poems by Atwood… and that is death. Death, grief, and sadness. Poetry is an odd thing. Sometimes “enjoyed” is not the right verb to describe the reading and interpretation of it. That is the case with this collection. The poems are often dark and depressing, morbid. So yes, “enjoyment” isn’t quite the correct word. But they were very compelling, even if I often felt disquieted as I read and absorbed them.

The poems are varied, moving from the death/grief of people, to zombies, to space, to even launguage. It was a fascinating journey along the spectrum of what death, grief, and loss look like. One of the many things I enjoyed was the juxtaposition of seemingly unrelated topics within a single poem, the way they are woven together, somehow making perfect sense with Atwood’s words.