GOODBYE EARTH AND OTHER POEMS

This is a collection of verse by the well known Harvard professor, and many of them already have appeared in The New Statesman, Encounter, The Yale Review, and Audience. They are of a high calibre and skill, even if sometimes obscure. As to their obscurity, Richards has helped out his readers with an occasional explanatory note. But his main contention about his poetry is one made by Coleridge that ""Poetry gives most pleasure when only generally and not perfectly understood"". These poems definitely convey the pleasure of concrete expression, rhythms, and expert technique; even when the meaning is a bit faint the sense of something worthwhile and deep and original is conveyed. For connoisseurs, a definite contribution.