Reviews
"These essays . . . address contemporary poets of the Eighties and Nineties with wit and intelligence and a fierce belief in principles. While many may not agree with Logan's views, this winner of the National Book Critics Circle Citation for Excellence in Reviewing is bound to stimulate." -- Library Journal
--Library Journal's Academic Newswire
"If his tone is sometimes acerbic and his remarks sometimes harsh, his fearless honesty is nonetheless refreshing. Readers will appreciate his thoughtful analysis and thorough knowledge of each poet's work, as well as his obvious love of the genre."--Library Journal
--Library Journal
"Firmly establishes him as the preeminent poet-critic of his generation with none of the back-slapping mutual-admiration-society stuff that passes for literary comment these days. Logan's hard-hitting reviews and carefully measured essays rely on wit, grace, and learning. . . . A masterful survey of contemporary verse."--Kirkus Reviews
--Kirkus Reviews
"Reputations of the Tongue speaks a truth acknowledged by poets in private but not in public. 'A gifted mediocrity prevails' in contemporary American and British poetry. This plight makes our period neither better nor worse that others, but examining causes and naming overhyped names is bad for business and morale. But if poetry is to matter, then it must generate thoughtful reviewing that fearlessly conveys the turbulence of the 'act of reading, its furies as well as its gratifications.' William Logan's critical bedevilments -- as well as his celebrations -- are indispensable."-- Boston Globe
--Boston Globe
"For Logan, each poet, each poem present a separate case, one that he judges without theory, dogma, or unnecessary recourse to the personal life, but rather by gauging the effect of the words on the page."-- New Criterion
--New Criterion
"An invigoratingly diverse, coherently informed chronicle of assessments of first (or latest) volumes and established reputations. . . . A vlove worth holding on to."-- Times Literary Supplement
--Times Literary Supplement
"He is both a theorist of the imagination and a good pratical critic." - World Literature Today
--World Literature Today
"Desperate Measures proffers a bundle of outstanding critical commentary, treating poetry with the schooled sensibility and arrogance of taste that best requites the art's convulted demands upon our attention."
--The Georgia Review