Pulitzer Prize finalist Elizabeth Alexander--considered one of America's most important contemporary poets--reflects with gratitude on her life after the sudden death of her husband.
Elizabeth Alexander composed and recited "Praise Song for the Day" for President Barack Obama's 2009 inauguration. She is the author of six books of poetry--including American Sublime, a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize--and is the first winner of the Jackson Prize for Poetry and a National Endowment for the Arts and Guggenheim fellow. She is the Thomas E. Donnelley Professor of African American Studies at Yale University.
"[A] deeply touching memoir."--GOOP
"[A] gorgeous and intimate tribute."--Newsday
"[Elizabeth Alexander] is gifted with an incredible ability to put
words to meter and create profound meaning."--The Root
"[In THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD, Elizabeth Alexander] tells a love
story that is, itself, a story of loss."--WAMC Northeast Radio
"A deeply intimate and lyrical portrait."--Essence
"A moving tribute to her late husband's memory and a deeply felt
meditation on loss, love and literature."--Publisher's Weekly
"A powerfully poetic testament to living on through those we
loved."--Family Circle
"A radiant book of love's everlastingness and art's infinite
sustenance."--Booklist (starred review)
"Accomplished poet Elizabeth Alexander paints the lush details of a
life well-lived in her memoir, THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD."
--The Charlotte Observer
"Alexander relays the story of her husband's sudden death and how
her grief affected her. Using her gift for words, however, she was
able to find meaning in her loss"--BookReporter
"An elegy that records, in hypnotic waves of love and grief."--New
York Times, T Magazine
"Beautiful, warm, lyrical, honest and reverent, THE LIGHT OF THE
WORLD is a loving tribute to a much-loved husband, and to the
strength, tenacity and determination of the wife left behind."
--Winnipeg Free Press
"Elizabeth Alexander has written a brave and beautiful book about
love and loss-the deep pain that comes with such a loss, and the
redemptive realization that such pain is a small price to pay for
such a love."--Jeannette Walls, New York Times bestselling author
of The Glass Castle
"Feel[s] authentic and true."--The Economist
"In art, in poetry and in her community of friends and family,
Alexander finds divinity. The memoir itself is, of course, art. Its
eloquent, grief-struck gratitude draws the reader in, and we
celebrate and mourn alongside Alexander."--Miami Herald
"In THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD, Alexander discovers a warmth that will
remind some readers of the deeper truth of grieving: It is a sign
of love."--New York Times Book Review
"It is both raw and exquisitely crafted, mercilessly direct and
sometimes lavishly metaphorical... THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD is, quite
simply, a miracle."--Boston Sunday Globe
"Like a poem, so carefully has each word, each sentence, been
chosen and polished."--Entertainment Weekly
"Love - for a marvelous man, for her sons, for the textures and
pleasures of the world - shines on every page of Elizabeth
Alexander's THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD. This acutely observed study of
what it means to lose one's beloved is a profound and beautiful
contradiction: a joyous book that faces head-on the deepest grief,
written with art and courage, and with limitless heart."--Mark
Doty
"Remarkably uplifting."--The Washington Post
"She shows us how feeding your family and remembering to be aware
of the small details of everyday life are the bedrocks of true
connection. In this book of prose, each page is a poem."--O, The
Oprah Magazine
"The book is a testament to ardor, and also to profound
loss."--Valley News
"The poet's answer to her husband's death is spiritual and
ethical."--Editors' Choice, New York Times
"This is a beautifully written, heartrendingly candid account of
the abrupt loss of her husband by the distinguished poet Elizabeth
Alexander. It is a vivid, intensely rendered elegy of a remarkable
man--husband, father, artist, chef. Both a memoir and a portrait of
a marriage, THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD is, as its title suggests, a
bittersweet testament to love and the memory of love, one of the
most compelling memoirs of loss that I have ever read."--Joyce
Carol Oates
"This is a compelling memoir, told through a poetic voice that
blends prose and poetry as Alexander details the death, the loss
and the grief that she and her sons experience."--Neworld
Review
"This is a gorgeous love story, written by one of America's
greatest contemporary poets. Graceful in its simplicity, sweeping
in scope, this book is proof that behind the boarded up windows of
America's roiled marriages and ruined affairs, true love still
exists, and where it does exist, it graces the world-and us-with
light and hope. Elizabeth Alexander is a prose writer of deep
talent and affecting skill. With ease, she peels back layer after
layer to show the soft secrets of affection, the kindness, and the
wide open generosity of a full hearted man and talented artist, who
had more love to give in his relatively short lifetime than most of
us will ever know."--James McBride, National Book Award-winning
author of The Good Lord Bird and #1 New York Times bestseller The
Color of Water
"This memoir is a celebration of love, life, books, family, food
and friends. Reading THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD is like reading an
extended narrative poem, the main character, though dead, is fully
alive on the page. This is more elegy than memoir, a tribute to her
husband's memory-her memories of him with her."--Tallahassee
Democrat
"THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD is a celebration of life, a portrait of
grief, and a lesson in the healing power of memory."--KMUW
"THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD is a tale of beautiful people who made a
beautiful life together-a life of delicious food, fresh flowers,
music, and friends."--Los Angeles Review of Books
"THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD is an absolutely luminous read, the kind
full of incompressible dimension best experienced in its
totality."--Brain Pickings
"THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD is as beautiful and moving as a gorgeous
piece of music. The minute I finished it, I longed to read it
again."--Anna Deavere Smith
"THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD is crushing, lovely, painful, and above all
powerful. It is difficult to believe that anyone who has suffered
loss will remain unaffected by this marvelous book."--New York
Journal of Books
"THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD simply took my breath away."--First Lady
Michelle Obama, MORE
"With tenderness and fierce poetic precision, [Alexander] realizes
a simple truth: that death only deepens the richness of a life
journey that must push on into the future. A delicate,
existentially elegiac memoir."--Kirkus
|
Ask a Question About this Product More... |
|
