Here are five books published in 2015 that I enjoyed
immensely:
1. James Wood’s The
Nearest Thing to Life, a collection of four extraordinary essays blending
personal history with literary criticism. One of the pieces, "Why?," originally
appeared in The New Yorker. (See my
post here.)
2. Helen Vendler’s The
Ocean, the Bird and the Scholar, a brilliant essay collection on poets and
poetry, including two wonderful New
Yorker pieces, “American X-Rays: Forty Years of Allen Ginsberg’s Poetry”
and “Ardor and Artifice: Merrill’s Mozartian Touch.” (See my posts here and
here.)
3. Julian Bell’s Van
Gogh: A Power Seething, a superb, concise, stimulating study of Van Gogh’s
life and work by one of my favorite art critics. (See my post here.)
4. Michael Hofmann’s Where
Have You Been?, a delicious collection of essays on James Schuyler,
Elizabeth Bishop, Robert Lowell, Zbigniew Herbert, Adam Zagajewski, and Les
Murray, among others. It also contains an excellent piece on my favorite
Canadian poet, Karen Solie. (See my post here.)
5. Colm Tóibín’s On Elizabeth Bishop, an exquisite study of Bishop’s poetry, including her great New Yorker poem, “At the Fishhouses,” which Tóibín ingeniously connects with James Joyce’s “The Dead.” (See my post here.)
Correction: I see now that Michael Hofmann's Where Have You Been? is not a 2015 book. It was published in 2014. But I read it this year, and so I'm going to keep it on my 2015 list.
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