Fire in the Conservatory

Recognition

“These poems by Linda Gregerson are ‘as good for the heart as conscious election,’ as one of them has it. The raising to consciousness of the heart’s many and often opaque concerns is the major work, and on its behalf her vivid sympathy brings before us a wonderfully various cast of characters: Goering, Barnum & Baily, The Magdalen, Albert Speer and ‘Washington Stokes, retired, who cleaned fish to order for fifty-nine years.’ Even George Steinbrenner makes a cameo appearance. They are all both new and recognizable, the way we are strange and familiar to ourselves in heightened moments such as the reading of her poems can bring.”–William Matthews

“Intense and athletic, Linda Gregerson’s poetry is possessed in the best senses of the term: craft and passion.”–Marvin Bell