“Tobin's graceful movement between what's lost and the here-and-now, between earthy popular culture and metaphysical concerns is characteristic of…. a poet fast becoming one of his generation's finest.” —Ned Balbo, The Antioch Review
"These essays usefully identify a tradition of twentieth-century Atlantic Irish writing in both Irish literature and American. Tobin's commentaries will appeal both to the general reader . . . of poetry and to the academic reader who has an interest in American literature, Irish studies, and the conundra of hyphenate or hybrid subcultures. Tobin has already established the canon of poetry in that literature with
The Book of Irish American Poetry.
Awake in America promises to be a useful and popular companion to that book." —Thomas Dillon Redshaw, University of St. Thomas
“...a prodigious and remarkable work of literary scholarship.” —Eamonn Wall
"Lola Ridge stood a little apart from the rest, with what it is not too much to characterize as her own genius." —William Rose Benét
"
Poet's Work, Poet's Play has immense pedagogical value." —Laurence Goldstein, editor,
Michigan Quarterly Review