On Charm

“Christopher Bursk’s The First Inhabitants of Arcadia is a charming declaration of love for the English language – for words, letters (both their shapes and sounds), for prefixes, suffixes, parts of speech, punctuation. And with just enough pathos, current event and political dimension this collection, without really trying, serves as a timely counterpart to all the intellectual movements that ultimately seem hostile to, or at least fundamentally frustrated by, language. As a result, in an age when books and scholar-poets are rarely considered charming, it is a pleasure to read a poet who takes such pleasure in his medium.”

Rattle