McNair to Brinkerhoff Email #10

I like the sketches, especially because they have so much of you in them — that astringent simplicity that is your trademark.

 

I like the floating house with its two windows, but I’m not sure we’re there yet. The book being so peopled, and so involved, title poem and all, with the interior lives of people, the sketches seem a little too conceptual to me at this point. What I liked about The Lost Child, I see this now, was the way it combined your atmospheric and metaphorical imagination with the sense of character and the human predicament (and presence) that are so important to me as a poet.

 

I hope this doesn’t dampen your spirits, and if it turns out you can’t manage the final product before the catalog copy is due, so be it. I love your work, and I’m still convinced you’re the illustrator I want!

 

I’m attaching what will be the last poem in the book. It picks up the themes of death and loss at the beginning of the book, the pursuit of beauty in section 3, and the consolations and praises of section 4.

 

All best to you as we continue,

Wes