SOURCE: A review of No Voyage, and Other Poems in Agenda, Vol. 4, Nos. 5 & 6, Autumn, 1966, pp. 58-60.

Kaufman is an American educator and writer. In the following excerpt, he finds Oliver's poems in No Voyage, and Other Poems to be more personal than the work of Edna St. Vincent Millay.

In Mary Oliver's poems No Voyage one is tempted to look for the influence of Edna St. Vincent Millay, especially since Miss Oliver was secretary to the poet's sister and lived at the poet's estate. But as any writer knows influence is not so obvious as "What I like I follow".

The person, the mind, in Miss Oliver's poems seems to be a mind with the Millay sensitivity. But she is not cornered by the economics or social conditions that were the warp of so much of Millay's poetry. Miss Oliver's poems are more personal, yet move at a...