Amherst Reads October 2011: Come On All You Ghosts by Matthew Zapruder '89

Come on All You Ghosts
by Matthew Zapruder '89

"Zapruder's improvisations (or so they appear) enlist the reader as co-explorer, stumbling into candid self-revelations or surreal quips with wide-eyed grace." --Library Journal

• Learn more about the author (view alumni profile)
• Listen to the interview with Matthew Zapruder '89 and Tess Taylor '00
• Read the New York Times review
• Read three poems from Come on All You Ghosts
• Read a message from the author and join the discussion

Matthew Zapruder's third book mixes humor and invention with love and loss, as when the breath of a lover is compared to "a field of titanium gravestones / growing warmer in the sun." The title poem is an elegy for the heroes and mentors in the poet's life--from David Foster Wallace '85 to the poet's father--and demonstrates a new, expansive range for the poet. Surprising and direct, Come On All You Ghosts wrestles with the desire to do well, to make art and to confront the vast events of the day.