Editor’s bookshelf

“Haunted and haunting poems”

So says Eavan Boland of 2009 Lurie Distinguished Visiting Author-in-Residence Sandra Gilbert’s latest collection of poetry, Aftermath (W.W. Norton). Former U.S. Poet Laureate Billy Collins, another admirer, describes Gilbert’s poetry as “beautifully situated at the intersection of craft and feeling.” The recipient of the John Ciardi Award for Lifetime Achievement in Poetry, Gilbert also coauthored Madwoman in the Attic: The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination, a landmark in feminist scholarship.

Savvy business advice

First action item: reexamine that budget. It’s the starting point and catalyst for snagging customers, according to Customer-Driven Budgeting (Business Expert Press), a guide for growing small businesses, authored by AFB Business Solutions founder Floyd Talbot, ’71 English.

Queenly power

Professor Emerita of English Arlene Okerlund’s Elizabeth of York (Palgrave Macmillan) tells the story of the woman whose marriage to King Henry VII ended England’s War of the Roses and ushered in the Tudor dynasty. “Illuminating, fascinating … a welcome addition to the sparse literature about one of England’s more dynastically important queens,” declares Renaissance Quarterly. Okerlund is also the author of Elizabeth Wydeville: The Slandered Queen.

Changing history

Dr. Nafis Sadik, the first female director of a United Nations agency, widely considered the world’s foremost advocate for women’s health and reproductive rights, is the subject of Assistant Professor of English Cathleen Miller’s new biography, Champion of Choice (University of Nebraska Press). An obstetrician and devout Muslim born into a prominent Indian family, Sadik began working with the UN Population Fund in 1971, determined to provide females with the education and means to control their own fertility. CNN founder Ted Turner calls Miller’s book “a rigorous yet eloquent account of Dr. Sadik’s inspirational career, and a beautiful and long-awaited tribute.”