Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > Carroll, Jim - Publishers Weekly (review date 28 September 1998)

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Publishers Weekly (review date 28 September 1998)

SOURCE: A review of Void of Course, in Publishers Weekly, Vol. 245, September 28, 1998, p. 96.

[In the following brief review, the critic discusses the poems in Void of Course.]

An alternately self-exposing and swaggering Bukowskian diarist, Carroll reinforces his rock-star-like pop culture niche with his latest volume of poetry, which somewhat resembles a compilation of power ballads. Given that Carroll’s fame was established by the beloved 1970's memoir of drug addiction The Basketball Diaries, it makes sense that his poetry [in Void of Course] works to further the author’s forever young and ostensibly hip public image, as in this ode to the late Kurt Cobain: “You should have talked more with the monkey / He’s always waiting to negotiate / I’m still paying him off … But Kurt … / Didn’t the thought you’d never write / another song / Another...

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1. Introduction
2. Principal Works
3. Criticism
   1. Seamus Cooney (review date 1 November 1973)
   2. Gerard Malanga (review date November 1974)
   3. Jamie James (review date February 1980)
   4. Chet Flippo (essay date 26 January 1981)
   5. Publishers Weekly (review date 4 April 1986)
   6. Daniel L. Guillory (review date 15 April 1986)
   7. Christopher Lehmann-Haupt (review date 9 July 1987)
   8. Peter Delacorte (review date 12 July 1987)
   9. Kirkus Reviews (review date 15 May 1987)
   10. William Hochswender (review date 18 October 1987)
   11. Jim Carroll with Thomas Gladysz (interview date 1987)
   12. Cassie Carter (essay date Winter 1996)
   13. Publishers Weekly (review date 28 September 1998)
   14. Booklist (review date 15 October 1998)
   15. Jim Carroll with Suzan Alteri (interview date 13–19 January 2000)
4. Further Reading
5. Copyright