The sixth winner of the annual New Criterion Poetry Prize is Bill Coyle's The God of This World to His Prophet. Mr. Coyle's first collection of poems spans the divide between the minutely considered trappings of an often hard-bitten and desolate world and the larger, more elusive questions of belief. Shifting easily through registers of sober reflection, gentle satire, and even outright humor, his poems encompass landscape and dramatic situation with equal skill. Decoding the import in a stand of leafless trees or recounting the melancholy ruminations of a solitary figure in winter, Mr. Coyle finds "imaginings / projected on a darkened world of things." Also included are a number of poems translated from the Swedish that dovetail seamlessly with the author's own sensibility and concerns. His virtuosic mastery of prosodic forms, far from occluding his deeply felt subjects, reveals them to us with great force and immediacy. As Mr. Coyle puts it with characteristic precision and grace, "Artifice, at its heart, is the human touch describing / lucidly what the world, stripped to its essence, is."

About the Author
Bill Coyle's poems have appeared widely in magazines and anthologies, including the Hudson Review, The New Criterion, the New Republic, and Poetry. He is a translator from the Swedish, and his versions of the poet Hakan Sandell have appeared in PN Review and Ars Interpres and are forthcoming in the anthology The Other Side of Landscape. Mr. Coyle teaches in the English Department at Salem State College in Salem, Massachusetts. He lives in Somerville, Massachusetts.

Reviews
Reading 'Aubade,' the tiny poem [concluding] Coyle's...collection is like witnessing a hole-in-one. It's a single, flawless stroke. -- Eric McHenry * The New York Times *
Coyle is absolutely on top of his game [and] easily one of the best poets of his generation. -- David Mason * The Hudson Review *
[Coyle] writes with a clear flow of lively thought, and at the same time plays the whole instrument of poetry. * Richard Wilbur *
Throughout his poetic cosmology, Coyle's work is striking for its light touch and thoughtful content [and] for its unpretentious command of traditional forms. * The Antioch Review *
Vision by turns compassionate and comedic...striking for its light touch and thoughtful content...steadily measured and, often, meticulously rhymed. -- Ned Balbo * Antioch Review *
Bill Coyle is a welcome new voice in a crowded choir....A winning combination and collection. -- Brad Leithauserd, Author Of Darlington's



Book Information
ISBN 9781566637107
Author Bill Coyle
Format Hardback
Page Count 96
Imprint Ivan R Dee, Inc
Publisher Ivan R Dee, Inc
Weight(grams) 245g
Dimensions(mm) 218mm * 148mm * 14mm