SOURCE: "Meditative Gazing on Contemporary Poetry," in The Southern Review, Vol. 30, No. 3, Summer, 1994, pp. 638-40.

In the following excerpt, Hosmer reviews New and Selected Poems and praises Oliver's work for its simplicity and clarity.

The work gathered in Mary Oliver's impressive New and Selected Poems spans three decades, from No Voyage and Other Poems to House of Light; in addition, it presents thirty new poems as well as five not previously included in any volume. And so this volume affords an opportunity to take the long view of this poet's fine work, savoring its many pleasures and assessing its considerable merits. This is a poet whose enduring preoccupation lies with posing apparently simple questions, the answers to which involve contemplation of the deepest mysteries of knowing and being. Though Oliver's verse echoes with the acerbic ironies of Dickinson, the singing cosmic consciousness of Whitman, and the serene playfulness...