100,000+ Books, Games & Puzzles in-stock 🇳🇿

🎉 Meet Toy Hero - our brand-new toy store, built by the team behind Book Hero

How Poems Think

Book Hero Magic crafted this summary to help describe this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Summary
How Poems Think by Reginald Gibbons explores the unique intelligence embedded in poetry—how metaphors, sound, rhythm, and associative movements shape poetic thought. Drawing on a diverse range of poets from Sappho to Gwendolyn Brooks, Gibbons examines poetic elements such as rhyme, metonymy, and etymology as modes of thinking and feeling, revealing the enduring power and inventiveness of poetic expression across cultures and eras.
Read More
Format: Hardback
$18899
AVAILABLE WITH SUPPLIER Ships from our Auckland warehouse within 3-4 weeks

Found a better price? Request a price match

Book Hero Magic created this recommendation. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! IS THIS YOUR NEXT READ?

A thoughtful read for enthusiasts of poetry, literary scholars, and readers interested in the intersection of language and cognition within the arts and culture spheres.

Book Hero thinking about your next read

Book Hero Magic formatted this description to make it easier to read. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Description

To write or read a poem is often to think in distinctively poetic ways—guided by metaphors, sound, rhythms, associative movement, and more. Poetry’s stance toward language creates a particular intelligence of thought and feeling, a compressed articulation that expands inner experience, imagining with words what cannot always be imagined without them.

Through translation, poetry has diversified poetic traditions, and some of poetry’s ways of thinking begin in the ancient world and remain potent even now. In How Poems Think, Reginald Gibbons presents a rich gallery of poetic inventiveness and continuity drawn from a wide range of poets—Sappho, Pindar, Shakespeare, Keats, William Carlos Williams, Marina Tsvetaeva, Gwendolyn Brooks, and many others.

Gibbons explores poetic temperament, rhyme, metonymy, etymology, and other elements of poetry as modes of thinking and feeling. In celebration and homage, Gibbons attunes us to the possibilities of poetic thinking.

Book Hero Magic summarised reviews for this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! HOW HAS THIS BEEN REVIEWED?

"There are important considerations of rhyme in Russian poetry, discussions of classical Greek poetry, and there are brilliant moments of incisive commentary." — PN Review

"Poking into cobwebby corners, weaving narrative into discourse, using assemblage, How Poems Think is a trove. I read it with a pencil -- until I saw that underlining everything was the same as underlining nothing." — Beverley Bie Brahic, Poetry Magazine

Book Hero reading reviews

Book Details

INFORMATION

ISBN: 9780226277950

Publisher: The University of Chicago Press

Format: Hardback

Date Published: 23 September 2015

Country: United States

Imprint: University of Chicago Press

Audience: Tertiary education

DIMENSIONS

Spine width: 2.0mm

Width: 15.0mm

Height: 22.0mm

Weight: 454g

Pages: 208

About the Author

Reginald Gibbons is the Frances Hooper Professor of Arts and Humanities at Northwestern University. His most recent poetry collections are Creatures of a Day, a finalist for the National Book Award; and Slow Trains Overhead: Chicago Poems and Stories.

More from Arts & Culture

View all
  • Dylan's Pick
    Bold Types
    A tribute to 32 truly independent bookshops throughout Aotearoa New Zealand, from north of Auckland down to Dunedin, and coast to coast. Jane Ussher's photographs show every bookstore in its unique nature - including behind the counter, smoko rooms, the mess which tells the hardworking story behind the joy of matching books with customers. Jemma Moreira's careful editing has crafted...
    Hardback
    $5999
    Elsewhere:
    $7000
    In Stock
    Ships tomorrow
  • Disney Moana: The Official Cookbook
    New Release
    Disney Moana: The Official Cookbook
    Embark on a culinary adventure with Moana of Motunui with Pacific recipes inspired by Moana and Moana 2! After a long day of sailing to see how far you’ll go or keeping the demigod Maui out of trouble with Te Fiti, catch a break with the delicious dishes in Moana: The Official Cookbook! Featuring more than 50 recipes spanning the...
    Hardback
    $4499
    Elsewhere:
    $5299
    In Stock
    Ships tomorrow
  • This Angry Pen of Mine
    This Angry Pen of Mine by Layne Staley invites you to dive into the untold creative world of Layne Staley, the legendary voice behind Alice in Chains. This extraordinary collection showcases his handwritten lyrics, deeply personal poetry, stunning original artwork, rare photos, fan tributes, and so much more. Step into the world of Layne Staley like never before. For the...
    Hardback
    $7299
    Elsewhere:
    $8999
    In Stock
    Ships tomorrow
  • They Bloom Because of You
    Bestselling author and Instagram sensation Jessica Urlichs returns with a new collection of beautifully observed poems about the ever-evolving journey of motherhood - the hard, the magic and the fleeting. ‘A raw and honest read that makes you feel seen and understood in a way that will bring you to tears.’ - Hilary Swank ‘A book to keep close and...
    Paperback
    $3000
    Elsewhere:
    $3600
    (1)
    In Stock
    Ships tomorrow
  • Leaves of Grass
    A collectible new Penguin Classics series offers beautiful, slim, clothbound editions of ten favourite poets. In 1855, Walt Whitman published his first collection of poetry, Leaves of Grass. The volume received great praise from leading Transcendentalist poet Ralph Waldo Emerson. This encouragement led to what would become a lifelong project, as Whitman expanded and rewrote the volume until his death...
    Hardback
    $2200
    Elsewhere:
    $2400
    In Stock
    Ships tomorrow
  • Great Writers and the Cats who Owned Them
    Throughout history, cats and writers have bonded together in a magical combination of comfort, companionship and inspiration. The famous authors featured here range from Samuel Johnson, whose cat Hodge dined on oysters, and Edward Lear, whose charismatic cat Foss was missing half his tail, to Margaret Mitchell, L. M. Montgomery and Dorothy L. Sayers, who rescued her kitten Blitz from...
    Hardback
    $3999
    In Stock
    Ships tomorrow
  • Beautiful Chaos
    The Instant Sunday Times Bestseller Selected poems from bestselling author and Instagram poet, Jessica Urlichs. 'These words awaken the magic of life by celebrating the ordinary.' - Giovanna Fletcher Motherhood is messy and beautiful, and hard and humbling. We adore our children and sometimes we miss ourselves. Beautiful Chaos is a collection of raw, honest poems about motherhood, capturing everything...
    Paperback
    $2900
    Elsewhere:
    $3500
    In Stock
    Ships tomorrow
  • To the Women - The New Collection of Wise Words Every Woman Needs
    THE COMPLETELY UPDATED COLLECTION WITH OVER 70 BRAND NEW POEMS, FROM THE SUNDAY TIMES NO.1 BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF WILD HOPE AND WORDS TO LIVE BY 'Amazing . . . Donna's words speak to my heart' Davina McCall To the Women is a celebration of the beauty, strength, and joy of being a woman. A love letter to our deep capacity...
    Hardback
    $2999
    Available
    Ships in 4-6 weeks
  • The Odyssey
    Composed at the rosy-fingered dawn of world literature almost three millennia ago, The Odyssey is a poem about violence and the aftermath of war; about wealth, poverty and power; about marriage and family; about travellers, hospitality, and the yearning for home. This fresh, authoritative translation captures the beauty of this ancient poem as well as the drama of its narrative....
    By Homer
    Paperback
    $2999
    Elsewhere:
    $3599
    Backorder
    Ships late August
  • Wreck This Journal: Now in Colour
    The creative journey continues with Wreck This Journal: Now in Colour by Keri Smith, the latest and most vibrant edition of the groundbreaking series that redefined journaling. Celebrating its 10th anniversary, this edition brings the playful destructiveness of the original to life in dazzling full colour, adding a dynamic new dimension to the beloved prompts. Whether you're a seasoned Wreck-er,...
    Paperback
    $2500
    Elsewhere:
    $2800
    In Stock
    Ships tomorrow
  • Did I Ever Tell You This?
    In this unexpected memoir, written in a creative burst of just a few months in 2022, Sam Neill tells the story of how he became one of the world’s most celebrated actors, who has worked with everyone from Meryl Streep to Isabel Adjani, from Jeff Goldblum to Sean Connery, from Steven Spielberg to Jane Campion. By his own account, his...
    Paperback
    $3799
    Elsewhere:
    $4500
    Backorder
    Ships 1 Week
  • A Thousand Feasts
    THE INSTANT #1 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER From award-winning writer Nigel Slater, comes a new and exquisitely written collection of notes, memoir, stories and small moments of joy. 'Nigel Slater’s prose is the rarest delicacy of all: exquisite yet effortless, filled with heart, tenderness, yearning and humour' ELIZABETH DAY For years, Nigel Slater has kept notebooks of curiosities and wonderings, penned...
    Paperback
    $2999
    In Stock
    Ships tomorrow

Why buy from us?

Book Hero is not a chain store or big box retailer. We're an independent 100% NZ-owned business on a mission to help more Kiwis rediscover a love of books and reading!

Service & Delivery

Service & Delivery

Our warehouse in Auckland holds over 100,000 books, toys, board games and puzzles in-stock so you're not waiting for your order to arrive from overseas.

Auckland Bookstore

Auckland Bookstore

We're primarily an online store, but for your convenience you can pick up your order for free from our bookstore, which is right next door to our warehouse in Hobsonville.

Our Gifting Service

Our Gifting Service

Books make wonderful thoughtful gifts and we're here to help with gift-wrapping and cards. We can even send your gift directly to your loved one.