Nicholas Friedman's Petty Theft

Poet Nicholas Friedman's first book, Petty Theft (Criterion, 2018), is reviewed by A. M. Juster for the LA Review of Books this week. "With only Caitlin Doyle as serious competition, he has been building a case for himself as the heir apparent to Dana Gioia and the original 'New Formalists' — all of whom are now 65 or older," writes Juster. Keep reading:

Friedman displays his range in technique and subject in the several dozen poems of Petty Theft that are not portraits. In the title poem, he abandons Robinsonian distance and crafts a romantic and slightly erotic lyric with “crooked bodies nesting at the crooks.” In the four-section poem “Il Poverello,” the speaker wrestles with his religious faith:           

We trust that these are actually his bones.
A monk sits at a small desk, selling cards
to the bereaved. I cross myself, move forward,
and touch the pillar, darkening its stone.

Friedman returns to the subject of magic and magicians with “The Vanishing Bird Cage,” but the poem has a very different feel from that of “The Magic Trick” and “The Illusionist.” He quickens the pace with taut unrhymed iambic dimeter, and veers at the end (“How does the cage — / Like logic, it’s / collapsible”) in a manner reminiscent of Kay Ryan. “Distraction Display” is another strong Ryan-like poem that, like “The Vanishing Bird Cage,” uses dimeter and concludes with an unexpected flash of insight.

While I might quibble about a word choice or two, Nicholas Friedman’s first book demonstrates enormous technical prowess...

The full review is at LARB.