In the poem-essays that comprise A Duration, writing is a physical act where writing and lived experience support one another in bodies—animal, plant, mineral, and word bodies—that are injured and heal, that die and continue in new forms, playing new roles.  Here, in his fifth book, Richard Meier transmutes years of daily practices of attention—be it to a line spoken by Lear’s Fool, a train to Kingston, or  “red inside green stem below eight white petals in a spiral with space between them attached to the yellow center�—into mesmerizing trajectories through an always unfolding present. In the collapse of the border between writing and the body, A Duration, “play[s] both hearts with a heartbeat and kinship of place, time, mundanity in the continuous onrushing imagined joy.�

In the Pure Block of the Whole Imaginary pushes past the line and the fragment and toward the sentence, the thought trying to complete, the paragraph, a distinct passage. The poems, most a single paragraph, are comprised of several of the many things a paragraph is said to consist of, including, according to the OED: "a distinct passage or section of a text, usually composed of several sentences, dealing with a particular point, a short episode in a narrative, a single piece of direct speech, etc." The first poem in the project, though no longer the first in the book, was written while reading Francis Ponge's amazing The Making of Le Pre, which reproduces his notes toward the poem Le Pre alongside a translated type-written transcription. The form of the notes--crammed into every corner of the page, gathering observation, research, reading, quotations, anecdote--suggested a more inclusive way to think and write. The book, with its not-quite 50 prose poems, is also an imaginary completion, an echo or a shadow or shade, of Baudelaire's planned 100 Petits poemes en prose. The book, then, became a project only after the fact, or in response to the fact, of the poems' emergence. The opening of each section--the first few words from each poem in that section--operate as a kind of descriptive table of contents for each section and also a poem of sorts, as those chapter headings often were novels of the past.

A comprehensive survey of the work of a master of modernist design today. Alberto Campo Baeza, one of contemporary architecture s most distinguished voices, is renowned for a body of work that exudes the power of radical simplicity. The architectural ideas expressed in his buildings have ranged in scale from such small but beautiful residential structures as the Ture?gano, Gaspar, and De Blas houses to cultural facilities such as Andalucia s Museum of Memory in Granada, an addition to his earlier achievement, the Caja General Bank Headquarters. All share an uncompromising dedication to simple composition and demonstrate the ways in which he so brilliantly deploys disciplined restraint to achieve architectural silence in the face of the clamor of the modern city. This monograph features projects spanning four decades of international architectural practice. Contributions by Richard Meier and David Chipperfield offer critical commentary on Campo Baeza s persistent quest for beauty and relevance through his adherence to simplicity and a deeply felt devotion to modernist principles of architecture.

"Basking in the twilight of Late Romanticism, Meier . . . finds the rays seductive but damaging . . . Meier's sophisticated debut promises further developments."--"Publishers Weekly" on "Terrain Vague"
Domesticity, nature, and heartbreak inhabit this seriously playful second collection. Through precise description and inventive vocabulary, Meier's poems are relentless in their efforts to sincerely address contemporary uncertainty and love. A great book for readers looking to rediscover Romantic poetry: ""Embrace" was a word first used of forts, / until the one body fell down inside the other body, and was lost."

Misadventure won the inaugural Picador Poetry Prize, and is Richard Meier's first collection. Misadventure is a book about what we learn, and what we refuse to learn: although Meier's poems are often deceptively quiet in their address, the reader will soon discover a poet capable of illuminating the darkest corners of our lives by the very lightest of touches, and an ear simultaneously attuned to the lyric poem and the cadence of real speech. The collection also contains some disarmingly tender poetry on the experience of fatherhood. Misadventure is about all the hope and hopelessness lurking just below the surface of things, in our rooms, tables, coats and gardens - and leaves them enriched and strange, under the transforming eye of a fine new talent.

This book provides a fascinating history of the planning, design, and construction of the six-building Getty Center in Los Angeles, one of the great cultural complexes to be built in our time. Writing with wit and passion, Richard Meier takes us behind the scenes of the thirteen-year-long, one-billion-dollar project.

Richard Meier's first collection of poetry, Misadventure, won many admirers for its wry, wise and sharp-eyed insight into the minutiae of daily life. This, his second, Search Party, casts its net more widely - and looks at our experiences of being lost to others, as well as lost from ourselves. Many of the poems in this collection explore attempts to repair severed connections, or to forge links never properly established: from a father's desperate search for his son missing at sea, to a child's reaction to being denied a responsive gaze, and a footballer's sublime (if optimistic) pass to a teammate - these poems address the nature of the distances between us. Most importantly, they also show the lengths to which we will go to ensure that these distances are closed, and that the most basic of our needs are met: to be seen, to be recognized - and ultimately, sought out and found by one another.