Partial Memoirs

CATHARINE SAVAGE BROSMAN, one of America’s most accomplished and inspired poets, is a writer of extraordinary awareness. Partial Memoirs features moments, images, and experiences that exemplify her life, seamlessly intertwined with literature. Unlike many intellectuals, she is not suspicious of nostalgic memory, comparing a recollection with one of Proust’s that shows how memory is mediated by sensory experience. The style is unique, combining scintillating precision with poetic charisma. Here we have a new gem in the crown of American letters.
-Jonathan Chaves, Professor of Chinese at the George Washington University and author of the poetry collection Surfing The Torrent

Catharine Savage Brosman’s Partial Memoirs, composed when she was nearly ninety, reflects on experiences that have helped make up her poetry and prose. She looks her life squarely in the eye, including the trials, prejudices, and hardships along with happy times and successes. Examining her neuroses as well as her giftedness, she has created a candid depiction of a hard-working twenty-first century writer, flawed but truly talented.
-Olivia McNeely Pass, Professor, Nicholls State University, retired, co-author of Louisiana Poets: A Literary Guide

Catharine Savage Brosman, one of America’s finest poets, is also a literary historian and critic of French and American literature and fiction writer. Here, she focuses her attention on the persons and places that shaped her character and work: her mother, her father (who inspired her love of high culture), two divorced husbands (one of whom she remarried), and selected friends. Running throughout is a warm and infectious gratitude for the faces and places that have made her.
-Donald W. Livingston, Professor of Philosophy, Emory University and Past Fellow, Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, University of Edinburg