Alien vs. Predator (Poets, Penguin)

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Alien vs. Predator (Poets, Penguin) by Michael Robbins The debut collection of a poet whose savage, hilarious work has already received extraordinary notice. Since his poems first began to appear in the pages of The New Yorker and Poetry, there has been a lot of excited talk about the fresh and inventive work of Michael Robbins. Equal parts hip- hop, John Berryman, and capitalism seeking death and not finding it, Robbins's poems are strange, wonderful, wild, and completely unlike anything else being written today. As allusive as the Cantos, as aggressive as a circular saw, this debut collection will offend none but the virtuous, and is certain to receive an enormous amount of attention. Review BOOK OF THE YEAR: The New York Times (Dwight Garner) Slate (Troy Patterson) The New York Observer Commonweal Books & Culture Vol. 1 Brooklyn Complex The Poetry School The Millions (Emily Keeler) From the Back Cover "These poems are viciously inventive. Faster than you can rhyme stegosaur/megastore, Robbins code-switches between the English Canon and Top Forty: Nirvana and Blake, The Clash and Yeats, creating a political and social commentary that will make the hair stand on your head." -- Ange Mlinko "You may notice the cultural references first -- Guns N' Roses, Eric B. & Rakim, Fleetwood Mac, M*A*S*H, Star Wars -- and be tempted to tie Robbins to these anchors. But there are as many contemporary references in Eliot and Pound and Horace as there are in Robbins: carbon-dating isn't what distinguishes these poems. Robbins works in traditional and nontraditional forms that pivot on the beat, which he turns around, seamlessly and ruthlessly. The thread here is a long-distance conversation crammed into the available enjambment, as charged as the pop songs that play beneath the words." -- Sasha Frere-Jones "From the wild mixture of pop-culture and the English poetic tradition arises the voice -- brave, direct, brilliant, arrogant, unforgettable voice -- of a poet whom Catullus would recognize, whom Mayakovsky would welcome. This is a poetics that whips up the tradition and lashes 'a slap in the face of public taste.' Robbins is unafraid to bring back vulgarity -- that saving, generous, musical vulgarity which abruptly awakens us from our longish sleep-time in America. Yes, Michael Robbins is a rascal. The sort of rascal Francois Villon used to be. He takes no prisoners. His music is brutal -- and also intricate, rigorous, unpredictable. Mothers of America! let your kids read some of this wild, brave, real verse." -- Ilya Kaminsky   About the Author Michael Robbins was born in Topeka, Kansas. His poems and criticism have appeared in The New Yorker, Poetry, Harpers, The London Review of Books, The Village Voice, and several other journals. He received his PhD in English from the University of Chicago.