Ithaca: Poems
by David Lehman
Criterion Books, 2026
ISBN: 9781641775113 (hardcover)
70 pages
Winner of the New Criterion Poetry Prize
A recent article in a significant American magazine proclaims that the end of reading is here. Book consumption is declining, attention span is diminishing, and — thanks to a plague of online gambling and ubiquitous social media — America is transitioning into a post-literate society. The inconvenient truth in these notions should make us stop and think, and then work vigorously to reverse the trends. Yet I want to disagree with the article’s core idea. It’s too soon to call in the undertaker. Reading is not dead. And it never will be, as long as we are graced with original writers like David Lehman, and radiant books like his latest work: Ithaca: Poems.
Ithaca: Poems is two books in one. The first part is one 30-page poem (Ithaca) comprising 30 sections connected by recurring themes. The second part (Gifts Reserved for Age) is made of 30 one-page-long poems.
“Happy as Ulysses is he who ventures forth … “
The first poem begins with this line, foreshadowing the entire book which highlights a poet’s odyssey across the wine-dark seas of his overflowing life.
Prepare to be surprised, delighted, enlightened. When I first started reading, I thought of the great passage in Emerson’s essay about Montaigne:
“I see the most determined of men: his force and terror inundate every word; the commas and dashes are alive; so that the writing is athletic and nimble, — can go far and live long.”
Every poem in Lehman’s book shows us the man behind it, flashes of insight and self-revelations from deep experiences and momentous moments. It’s all delivered in a writing style that mingles clear expression with an exquisite interplay of words on fire.
What does Lehman believe in? … Every poem answers this question. One of the most joyful is number 16 in the book’s first half, Ithaca:
Happy is the man who resists
the panic of change
who abandons the metropolis
smuggles ideas, spies on the goddess,
sneaks into her fortress,
and takes up residence within.
On her island they play
calypso music all day
and all day he sleeps
and she sleeps and he never asks
what she believes in and
she never asks for his opinion
and at night when the beach is empty
they swim naked in the sea.
Ithaca: Poems, is a world within worlds; a refutation to the theory that reading is kaput; and an anti-dote to personal discouragement. For in revealing so many authentic truths about himself, Lehman has shined a light on our own bright spirits within.
— Michael Pastore
2026 July 19
Ithaca, New York
