PHANTOMS ING - Softcover

In combining their work, poet James Laughlin and photographer Virginia Schendler explore independent but complementary ways of seeing. The poems are not meant as captions for the photographs, nor do the "found" images-- gathered in Manhattan's SoHo and TriBeCa neighborhoods-- function as illustrations to the poems. But taken together, they reinforce common themes: the urgencies of time and desire, the dreamlike qualities of ordinary experience. Schendler's photographs address the illusive nature of a changing city, while Laughlin's poems, with their colloquial yet eloquent tone, follow the rhythms of the street. Playful as well as profound, this collaboration will prompt new associations in the imagination of its audience.

James Laughlin, the publisher of New Directions books since 1936, is also a noted poet. In his lyrics and in his love poems he blends the spirit of the Latin poets with his own keen ear for the subtleties of colloquial speech. Beneath the wit of this poetry there are pungent truths about the human condition. His Collected Poems were published in 1994 by Moyer Bell.

Virginia Schendler has photographed inner-city school children, and has made portraits of writers and artists. In the semi-abstract color photographs of Phantoms, she has sought to capture some of New York's own expression: the ironies and the humor, the complex and less-familiar provocations of older parts of the city.