Outside the Fold, Outside the Frame - Softcover

Skeen (English/Michigan State) writes poetry with an academic edge: Allusion and trope are her dominant motifs, and she understands the literary power of the elegy. Sexual personae, however, seem more important to her than do literary identities, and much of the volume is organized around gender themesof female alienation, mainlythat have a very dated 1970s feel to them. In many of the poems (Short Story, for example), theres an unspoken equating of literary narration with personal emancipation, a linkage that diminishes writing simply to a means of raising ones consciousness. Even the best sequencesthe interior narratives of The Inner City of Dreamsare harnessed to an annoyingly au courant sociology of verse, the collections primary concern of telling our stories overriding any consideration of what point or value the stories may have. This strategy becomes most evident when the poet assumes the voices of historical figures in her work, offering us Eves perspective on Original Sin (Eve, Eating Bananas, Sets the Record Straight) or Emily Dickinsons peculiarly contemporary take on her own career (Emily Reveals the Secret of Her Success). Whatever the merits of Skeens vision on such matters, her attempts to manipulate her audience will strike many as oppressive, and some as suffocating. -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.