David R. Slavitt

"In The Seven Deadly Sins and Other Poems, veteran poet David R. Slavitt touches on topics from the mundane to the mysterious with his signature wit and intelligence. In "Stupid," for instance, he transforms a simple head cold into an appreciation for the richness of consciousness, and in "Waking," the very effort of rising from bed becomes something like a miracle. Slavitt explores the range of the human condition with such ease and insight that readers cannot help but ponder what life is - and what it could be. What if - like the mythic sea creature in "The Dogfish" - humans could return to the womb when frightened? In the collection's title poem, Slavitt gives a voice to the Seven Deadly Sins, each of which claims, persuasively, to possess a value to humans that is seldom noticed or appreciated. Slavitt has a unique ability to examine an idea - be it virtue or vice, dark or blithe - and offer perspective and wisdom about the conundrums of our existence."--BOOK JACKET.

"In this memoir, David R. Slavitt recounts his day-to-day life on the campaign trail, describing the often surreal experience of being a pro-choice, pro-gay-marriage GOP candidate running against a pro-life Democrat. When Slavitt decided to make a run for the Massachusetts State Legislature in 2004, he knew the odds were against him. Though a well-respected writer, he was a political novice and a moderate Republican in a district where defeating any Democrat was next to impossible. But in the grandest of American traditions, hoping for the best and wanting to do some good, he threw his hat into the ring - and the result was a circus he could never have anticipated. From fundraising and door-knocking to angling for good press and mixing with nationally known candidates and officials, Slavitt navigates the choppy waters of state politics, learning as he goes. This book shows that American politics still has a heart."--Jacket.

"A selection of recent work as well as the best from thirteen volumes of poetry published across four decades, Change of Address highlights the magnitude and scope of David Slavitt's poetic achievement. Meditating on both the quotidian and the sublime and ranging from brilliant satire to tender elegy, this retrospective collection brings into sharp relief Slavitt's intelligence, strength of voice, and ease in varied poetic forms."--Jacket.

"David R. Slavitt does not believe in literary criticism so much as in "remarks," and in this witty and unusual work, he remarks on the life of the poet: how it was - and how it is - to be an American writer in our time. Combining personal reminiscence with deft literary analysis, incisive biographical sketches, and, sometimes, literary gossip, the essays in Re Verse give new perspectives on the famous, including Harold Bloom, Robert Penn Warren, Robert Frost, and Stephen Spender, and recover the charms of the nearly forgotten, such as Dudley Fitts, Winfield Townley Scott, Merrill Moore, and John Hall Wheelock."--Jacket.

Epic poem, biography, literary criticism, historical romance - in A Gift, David Slavitt presents the fascinating life of Mozart's librettist, Lorenzo da Ponte, one of history's great unknowns, a man blessed and cursed by his conviction that within him lay the capacity for literary greatness. Educated in the church, the young da Ponte carouses in Venice, flees Italy, and finds himself in Austria, trying to establish a career in the theatre. Under the tepid patronage of Joseph II of Austria, he turns out libretti for Salieri and learns the "whorey tricks" of writing on demand: "Adaptation, translation, theft.". Then, on the brink of despair, he encounters Mozart - boorish, preferring crude farce to literary grace. Still, the partnership thrives with The Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni, Cosi fan tutte. But good luck is not to be trusted, and "misfortune is not reliable either.". Despite his brilliant gift, success eludes da Ponte. Ever gullible, ever generous, he is destined to accumulate others' debts, to be at the wrong place at the wrong time, to be forgotten. Da Ponte lives out his life in the fledgling United States, plagued by sickness, debt, and the implacably looming specter of failure. Slavitt has created a lovely, heartening book, one that reminds us that untested faith is no faith at all. Alight with muted passion, A Gift chronicles a man's refusal to despair despite the growing awareness that nothing awaits but poverty and ignominy - "that this ill-fitting garment is what the wardrobe holds." Through Slavitt's lively imagination, we feel reverence rather than pity for the dogged nobility of da Ponte's struggle. Ultimately, Lorenzo da Ponte is a hero, his life a victory.

John Smith is an eminent historian, secure in his well-paid position as an endowed professor at a major university. Any day he expects a favorable reply to his application for a residency at the Villa Sfrondata, a foundation-supported colony for artists and intellectuals on the banks of Italy's Lake Como, where he hopes to finish work on a study of Mussolini. John Smith - the other John Smith - is a bitter and failed novelist, an adjunct assistant professor of English at the same university. Suffering from writer's block, ignored by his daughter, hounded by his former wife's attorney for back alimony, and about to lose his job, his prospects could not be dimmer - that is, until the day the Villa Sfrondata's invitation to the eminent historian is delivered to him by mistake. Before you know it, the down-and-out-how-can-things-get-worse-what-have-I-got-to-lose John Smith is in Italy, ensconced, imposter though he is, in a room at the centuries-old villa. But what had promised to be a blissful if ill-gotten idyll quickly sours. The villa is drafty and decaying, the staff are surly and incompetent, and the other residents - among them a Nigerian economist, a Washington lawyer, a book designer, and art historian, and a feminist poet from California - are a motley and eccentric group whom Smith finds all but insufferable. He seizes every opportunity to deflate their overblown pretensions with a razor-sharp wit, which he possesses in astonishing abundance. At the same time, he must take care that some misstep does not reveal him as a fraud. His life is further complicated when one of the guests - the despised feminist poet - mysteriously disappears. . After passing through what he calls "a cloudy afternoon of the soul," including the very real fear that he will be implicated in the disappearance of the poet, Smith contrives in the end to amend his life and even to revive his all but abandoned literary career. This devastatingly satiric and funny book, David R. Slavitt's fiftieth, is a complicated burlesque that turns out to be a moving story of human frailty and spiritual rebirth. It is a feat of literary legerdemain that will dazzle even admirers of Slavitt's Turkish Delights, Lives of the Saints, Salazar Blinks and The Hussar.