Solving for X

Robert B. Shaw is a professor of English at Mount Holyoke College. He writes frequently on modern and contemporary poetry. His own books of poems include Below the Surface and Solving for X (winner of the Hollis Summers Poetry Prize).

"His best poems come when he looks into his own heart, then explores how that heart—a poet's heart—can encompass a nation." (The New York Times) "Shaw's Solving for X in both execution and subject matter displays the sensibility of one who has thought long and productively about his craft.... Shaw's talent shines forth powerfully." (Pleiades) "Robert Shaw's world is one in which human effort—in the garden, the workplace, the home, the soul—is always imperfect, but always forgiven. Although the voice is dependable, Shaw's images repeatedly surprise: for instance, the hammer and nails of a man tacking up a Christmas garland, which metamorphose into Instruments of the Passion.… When Shaw finds, at the bottom of a wishing well, a 'copper-scaled leviathan,' I find myself wishing I'd thought of that—and of so much else in this excellent book."