Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > Carson, Anne - Richard Holinger (review date winter 1997)

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Richard Holinger (review date winter 1997)

SOURCE: Holinger, Richard. Review of Plainwater, by Anne Carson. Midwest Quarterly 38, no. 2 (winter 1997): 235-36.

[In the following review, Holinger compliments Carson's unique skill with descriptive language in Plainwater.]

In one of Plainwater's essays, Canadian Anne Carson writes, “I will do anything to avoid boredom. … You can never know enough, never work enough, never use the infinitives and participles oddly enough, never impede the movement harshly enough” (29). Allusions to Foucault, Heidegger, Husserl, and Hegel confirm her postmodern, deconstructive emphasis. The theme of water that floods each part lends credence to one's notion of seldom having a metaphysical floor to stand on, the aberrations of grammar, syntax, punctuation, and linear movement floating one weightless.

The sections “Mimnermos: The Brainsex Paintings” and “The Life of Towns”...

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1. Introduction
2. Principal Works
3. Criticism
   1. Guy Davenport (review date spring 1987)
   2. Barbara K. Gold (review date fall 1990)
   3. Judith Kitchen (review date fall 1993)
   4. Alexander M. Forbes (review date spring 1995)
   5. Brain Evenson (review date fall 1995)
   6. Sandra M. Gilbert (review date August 1996)
   7. Adam Phillips (review date fall 1996)
   8. Elisabeth Frost (review date November 1996)
   9. Richard Holinger (review date winter 1997)
   10. Gail Wronsky (review date spring 1997)
   11. Jeff Hamilton (review date summer-fall 1997)
   12. Nicole Cooley (review date fall 1998)
   13. Bernard Knox (review date 19 November 1998)
   14. Sharon Wahl (review date spring 1999)
   15. Jed Rasula (review date summer-autumn 1999)
   16. Robert Lamberton (review date winter 2000)
   17. Phoebe Pettingell (review date March-April 2000)
   18. Stanley Corngold (review date April 2000)
   19. Anne Carson and Stephen Burt (interview date 3 April 2000)
   20. Ian Rae (essay date autumn 2000)
   21. Elizabeth Lowry (review date 5 October 2000)
   22. Harriet Zinnes (essay date February 2001)
   23. Anne Carson and Mary Gannon (interview date March-April 2001)
   24. Josephine Balmer (review date 25 May 2001)
   25. David C. Ward (essay date May-June 2001)
   26. Ian Rae (review date summer 2001)
   27. John Burt (review date autumn 2001)
   28. Chris Jennings (essay date fall 2001)
   29. Priscilla Long (review date October 2001)
   30. David Baker (review date spring 2002)
   31. Roger Gilbert (essay date spring 2002)
   32. Peter Green (review date 7 October 2002)
   33. Alan Jacobs (review date March-April 2003)
   34. Carol Moldaw (review date spring 2003)
4. Further Reading
5. Copyright