Lucid, ardent, and contemplative, May Sarton was one of America's best-loved writers. This comprehensive collection celebrated six decades of bold imagination and fifteen books of poetry, the creative output of a lifetime. Arranged chronologically, these poems reveal the full breadth of Sarton's creative vision. Themes include the search for an inward order, her passions, the natural world, self-knowledge, and in her latest poems, the trials of old age. Moving through Sarton's work, we see her at ease in both traditional forms and free verse, finding inspiration in snow over a dark sea, a cat's footfall on the stairs, an unexpected love affair. Here is the creative process itself, its sources, demands, and joys—a handbook of the modern poetic psyche.

Appearing in book form for the first time, this treasure trove of letters illuminates the life of the beloved poet/writer from early childhood into middle age.

All her life, May Sarton carried on a voluminous private correspondence—with family, friends, and lovers. From the beginning, as these remarkable letters show, the essence of an extraordinary human being was present, her gifts ready to unfurl and mature.

Fittingly, an early letter thanks parents for books. Later we enter the world of the theater, then years rich with study, travel, teaching, and the discipline of craft. Sarton's deep anguish as World War II approaches pervades many letters, but readers will also encounter the things that gave Sarton joy: her love of flowers, her affection for animals, her celebration of beauty in all its guises.

As Sarton divides her time between America and Europe, in an era when ocean voyages were the norm, illustrious acquaintances and intimates are introduced, among them Eva Le Gallienne, Elizabeth Bowen, Virginia Woolf, Muriel Rukeyser, Julian and Juliette Huxley, and Louise Bogan. Always, Sarton's voice is clear and courageous, startlingly candid about her passions, her moods, and her vulnerabilities. Her words, seeming as fresh as when they were written, stand against the backdrop of the crucial events of the century as she invites old and new readers into her personal world.

This enchanting story and classic of cat literature is drawn from the true adventures of Tom Jones, May Sarton s own cat. Prior to making the author s acquaintance, he is a fiercely independent, nameless Cat About Town. Growing tired of his vagabond lifestyle, however, he concludes that there might be some appeal in giving up his freedom for a home. Finally, a house materializes that does seem acceptable and so do the voices that inhabit it. It is here that he begins his transformation into a genuine Fur Person. Sarton s book is one of the most beloved stories ever written about the joys and tribulations inherent in sharing one s life with a cat. It is now reissued in a gorgeous edition featuring David Canright s beautiful illustrations."

"I am here alone for the first time in weeks," May Sarton begins this book, "to take up my 'real' life again at last.That is what is strange—that friends, even passionate love,are not my real life, unless there is time alone in which to explore what is happening or what has happened." In this journal, she says, "I hope to break through into the rough, rocky depths,to the matrix itself. There is violence there and anger never resolved. My need to be alone is balanced against my fear of whatwill happen when suddenly I enter the huge empty silence if I cannot find support there."

In this, her bestselling journal, May Sarton writes with keen observation and emotional courage of both inner and outer worlds:a garden, the seasons, daily life in New Hampshire, books, people, ideas—and throughout everything, her spiritual and artistic journey. In this book, we are closer to the marrow than ever before in May Sarton's writing.

"This journal is not only rich in the love of nature and the love of solitude. It is an honorable confession of the writer's faults, fears, sadness, and disappointments. . . . On the surface, Journal of a Solitude is a quiet book, but if you will read it carefully you will be aware of violent needs and a valiant warrior who has bettled every inch of the way to a share of serenity. This is a beautiful book, wise and warm within its solitude." —Eugenia Thornton, Cleveland Plain Dealer

"A small, sophisticated, elegantly sentimental journey through a New Hampshire village summer. Our companions are an aging poet, who is sad because he can no longer write—he has lost the joy he used to have in simply being alive–and a young, mischievous female donkey, who is sad because she can't run and play—she has a touch of arthritis. . . . There is a moral, of course, but any moral looks dull next to the simple happiness of the old poet and his long-eared muse."—The New Yorker

May Sarton—poet, novelist, and chronicler—occupies a special place in American letters. This journal chronicles the year that began on May 3, 1982, her seventieth birthday. At her home in Maine, she savors "the experience of being alive in this beautiful place," reflecting on nature, friends, and work. "Why is it good to be old?" she was asked at one of her lectures. "Because," she said, "I am more myself than I have ever been."

"Sarton has fashioned her journals, 'sonatas' as she calls them, into a distinctive literary form: relaxed yet shapely, a silky weave of reflection, sensuous observation and record of her daily round, with the reader made companion to her inmost thoughts. . . . It's a book rich in warmth, perceptiveness and reassurance." —Publishers Weekly

"As ever, Sarton's journal entries provide a piquant immersion in the life of a graceful, astute writer and a gentle, vibrant woman. . . Sharing her responses to other authors is always enlightening, and her comments on her own poetry and fiction prove particularly edifying. Like Sarton's other journals . . . this gracious sharing of private moments, critical perceptions, and excitement over work-in-progress will find a deeply appreciative audience."—Booklist

"Sarton has been the lighthouse light for millions of women, and despite the dimming of that light, she remains [in this book] the Sarton who wrote Journal of a Solitude." —Library Journal

"I had always imagined a philosophical journal of my seventy-ninth year, dealing with the joys and problems, the doors opening out from old age to unknown efforts and surprises. I looked forward to the year as a potent harvest," May Sarton writes. Assailed by debilitating illnesses, Sarton found herself instead using much of her energy battling for health. Yet, as this record shows, she did after all do what she had wanted to, as she persevered in work, friendships, and love of nature, discovering in the process new landscapes in the country of old age.

May Sarton's love for Juliette Huxley, ignited that first moment she saw her in 1936, transcended sixty years of friendship, passion, rejection, silence, and reconciliation. The letters chart their meeting, May's affair with Juliette's husband Julian (brother of Aldous Huxley) before the war, her intense involvement with Juliette after the war, and the rich, ardent friendship that endured until Juliette's death. While May's intimate relationship with Julian was not a secret, May's more powerful romance with Juliette was. May's fiery passion was a seductive yet sometimes destructive force. Her feelings for and demands on Juliette were often overwhelming to them both. In fact, Juliette refused all contact with May for nearly twenty-five years. Their reconciliation, after Julian's death, wasn't so much a rekindling as it was a testament to the profound affinity between them. Theirs was a relationship rife with complications and misunderstandings but the deep love and compassion they shared for one another prevailed. Included in this book are Sarton's original drafts of an introduction to these letters.

Poems

In this collection, May Sarton takes on the subject of herself in old age. Here are her observations and reflections both on daily events and on the larger questions of life and death, the difficulties and rewards of living alone. Her many fans will find Sarton as celebratory and fresh as ever.

"May Sarton is still teaching us how to think about the events of our lives, and how to sing about them, too."—Marge Piercy

A Novel

Set in the academic world of Harvard and Cambridge, this novel dramatizes the plight of the embattled American liberal in the 1950s. Its central character is Edward Cavan, a brilliant English professor, who commits suicide. His death sets off a shock wave among Cavan's friends and changes things for some of them forever.

"It is impossible not to be interested in [Sarton's characters] and concerned with what concerns them."—The New Yorker

Poems

In poems gathered into three sections under the titles "Letters from Maine," "A Winter Garland," and "Letters to Myself," Sarton's inspiration was a new, brief, and passionate love affair. The book celebrates that time, marks its passing, and opens up the poetic vision it left behind. The poems speak of the permanence of the memory of love and of the flowering it brings. They also draw on the rich, sometimes harsh, beauty of nature and its solace.

A Novel

When Laura Spelman learns that she will not get well, she looks on this last illness as a journey during which she must reckon up her life, give up the nonessential, and concentrate on what she calls "the real connections." The heart of the story is Laura's realization that for her the real connections have been with women: her brilliant and devastating mother, a difficult daughter, and most of all a woman she knew when she was young.

A Journal

May Sarton's eagerly awaited journals have recorded her life as a single, woman writer and, in later years, as a woman confronting old age. She completed this pilgrimage through her eighty-second year a few months before she died in 1995.

"Reporting from the front lines on the author's daily battle with a body and a mind that increasingly refuse to cooperate, At Eighty-Two captures this struggle with a simplicity, elegance and strength that is characteristic of its author and her lifetime of work."—Philadelphia City Paper

The marriage of Ned Fraser, a Boston banker, and Anna Lindstrom, a singer on the brink of fame, is a battlefield of opposing temperaments. Emotional and forthright, Anna battles against Ned's crippling reserve. In the clash of these two strong personalities, May Sarton explores the different ways that men and women express both anger and love.

"An amazing novel. . . . It ventures into new territory and opens fresh vistas into character and temperament."— Cleveland Plain Dealer

May Sarton describes living at her eighteenth-century house in Nelson, New Hampshire—how she acquired it, how it and the garden became part of her.

"Sensitive, luminous. . . . Love is the genius of this small, but tender and often poignant, book by a woman of many insights." —Brooks Atkinson, New York Times Book Review

"A drama of self-integration. . . . An enlarging, enriching, and clarifying experience." —Boston Herald

In these poems, May Sarton reflects on a journey undertaken to celebrate her fiftieth birthday, a journey that took her around the world to Greece via Japan and India, and finally home to the New Hampshire village where she had put down roots.

Ethereal and sensual, these intensely vivid poems capture the sights and textures of new places, people, and landscapes as experienced with a poet's fresh eye.

Sarton's memoir begins with her roots in a Belgian childhood and describes her youth and education in Cambridge, Massachusetts, her coming-of-age years, and the people who influenced her life as a writer.

"At long last in early June the Gordons were expected home at Dene's Court, the house in Ireland which Violet Dene Gordon had inherited." So begins May Sarton's evocative early novel about Violet Gordon's return, after thirty years, to her childhood home, where much had to be settled in one brief summer—fateful decisions about a marriage, a love affair, and a career. No influence was more important than the splendid old Dene's Court itself, and the memories it held.

This is the first journal Sarton wrote after she moved in 1973 from New Hampshire to the seacoast of Maine. Here she found the peace and aloneness she sought—and partly feared. The journal records the renewing of her life and work in this place.

"Absolutely compelling. . . . A monument to love, to friendship, and to the certainty that wisdom and goodness can still exist in a deeply troubled world." —Eugenia Thornton, Cleveland Plain Dealer

The "magnificent spinster" is Jane Reid, a teacher who became not simply a revered role model but a dear friend to Cam, the narrator of this novel within a novel. After Jane's death, the accidental discovery of poems written by Cam in her youth to Jane prompts a flood of recollection—and frees Cam to imagine in fiction Jane's passionately vibrant life.

In this affirmative journal, May Sarton describes both hardships and joys in the daily round of her life in old age—physical struggles couterbalanced by the satisfactions of frienship, nature, critical recognition, and creative spark.

Sarton writes perceptively of how age affects her: the way small things take longer and tire more, what it feels like to endure pain and to be afraid. Other days her energy returns, her spirits lift, and projects abound. Readers both new and old will cherish this latest dispatch from her ongoing journey.

"Vibrancy and abundant love of life. . . . [Sarton] proves once more to be wonderful company." —Andrea Barrett, Cleveland Plain Dealer

"For decades May Sarton's has been a major voice in autobiographical literature. . . . [Her journals] have broken fresh ground for the experience of women and the battle with age." —Rockwell Gray, Chicago Tribune

"[Sarton's] many admirers will cherish [Encore] as the still-strong voice of an intelligent, honest, perceptive, and compassionate human being." —Barbara Duree, Booklist

"Sarton demonstrates that old age can be a vibrant and liberating experience in which one possesses 'the freedom to be absurd, the freedom to forget things . . . the freedom to be eccentric.' [An] engrossing daily journal." —Publishers Weekly