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Every Day A Blue Sky:
Humorous and Satirical Poetry
by William Marr
130 English/Chinese poems + 41 Chinese poems ~ 241 pages
Price: $13.99 (Paperback)
$19.50 (Hardcover)
Publisher: Washington Writers Press
ISBN: 9798777372673
To Order: Amazon.com
ABOUT THE BOOK:
William Marr is a "super heavyweight" satirical poet in contemporary poetry. His satirical poems are magnificent in quantity, altitude and beauty. He has written poems about blackbirds, which can be used to name his satirical poems. In my opinion, his satirical poetry has a special beauty, which can be called "black beauty", closely connected to "black humor."
This black beauty makes people happy, surprised, painful, introspective and reflective. It is beautiful, but not gaudy; it is profound, but not confusing; it is flying, but not chaotic; it is solemn, but not dark. Carrying a few shrieks and a breeze, and after a few wisps of dark clouds, the black bird will bring us a clear and sunny day. Let's welcome it!
–From Liu Qiang's An Auspicious Bird–On the Satirical poetry of William Marr
ADVANCE PRAISE:
There have been more than five hundred review articles on William Marr’s poetry written by poets, critics and scholars from Taiwan, Hong Kong, Chinese Mainland, Southeast Asia and North America. The following are brief quotes from some of these articles:
Each (poem) is a window opening onto beauty and fluency. There is every shade of happiness and sadness, anger and peace … Their effortless renderings of a civilized mind in touch with an often-mad world are part of their mystery.
–Li-Young Lee, author of Rose and The City in Which I Love You
“Among the works of contemporary well-known Taiwanese poets, I feel that William Marr's poetry possesses the strongest internationalism … His work has unique artistic features–a good combination of science and literature, powerful explosiveness, deep and profound themes, and forceful satire. The poetry of William Marr is exceptionally rich and grand.”
–Gu Ji-Tang, scholar and critic
“His concise yet highly symbolic poetry, with a deep sense of humanity, adds a new dimension to the rich tradition of Chinese poetry … He bridges the gap between new and old, and between East and West.”
–Hong Kong Literature Monthly
“You will be absorbed in his poetry from the title to the last line. You will smile unknowingly or be greatly touched. The feeling is pure intellectual, or even scientific, without a trace of sentimentalism. I love his poetry with such admirable characteristics.”
–Chen Chien Wu, poet
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
William Marr, born in 1936 in Taiwan, came to America in 1961 as a graduate student and received his PhD degree in nuclear engineering from University of Wisconsin in 1969. After working in energy and environmental systems research for many years, he retired in 1996 to devote his full time to writing. He has published over 30 books of poetry in Chinese, English, bilingual (Chinese/English), multilingual (Chinese/English with French and Italian translations) and one with Korean translation. He is a former president of the Illinois State Poetry Society and the holder of two lifetime achievement awards, including one from the Marquis Who's Who Publications Board. In 2019, he was awarded the 60th Literary Award from Taiwan's Chinese Literature and Art Association. In recent years, he has also engaged in painting and sculpting and has held several art exhibitions in America and China. In 2016, in celebration of his 80th birthday, his sons, Dennis and Alvin, together with their wives, set up the William W. Marr Scholarship for Creative Writing in the College of Letters & Science of the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
FROM THE BOOK:
Every Day A Blue Sky
by William Marr
Every Day A Blue Sky
is merely a song
it has nothing to do with the eyes
the eyes
blurred and hazy
dare not look directly
at the stern face
of the sky
Every Day A Blue Sky
if you still are stubborn about it
then let the seductive neon lights answer you
it's the sky
the sky is the one that is color blind
*Every Day A Blue Sky is the title of a popular song in Taiwan in the 1980s when air pollution was still a severe problem there.
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