Doctor Jazz

In his first collection of poems since he won the National Book Award for Scrambled Eggs & Whiskey, Carruth writes the threadbare memories of old age and from the bleakest circumstances-such as the death of his own daughter-defiantly reclaims dignity and beauty. With the spit and bop of a jazzman playing all the right notes, Carruth lives his music, finding the low tones of terrible loss, the highs of great friendships.

Publishers Weekly

Octagenarian poet Carruth, who won the National Book Award in 1996 for Scrambled Eggs & Whiskey, and whose anthology The Voice That Is Great Within Us remains a stalwart of 20th-century American modernism, is a familiar and respected figure on the lit scene, having overcome decades of psychological and physical illnesses... the very appearance of another book will please this prolific writer's many fans.

Hayden Carruth is the author of twenty-five books of poetry, a novel, four books of criticism, and two anthologies, and has held fellowships from the Bollingen, Guggenheim and Lannan foundations, as well as the NEA. His many awards include the National Book Award for Poetry, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the Lenore Marshall/The Nation Award.