Breathtakingly honest, Blood Garden: An Elegy for Raymond allows readers a window into the Great War by plunging us into the lives of the real people who lived it. Pam Bernard's poetry is both accessible and haunting, and her images will teach students as much about war as any historical account.
Jean Trounstine,
Professor of Humanities
Middlesex Community College
33 Kearney Square, Lowell, MA 01852
978-656-3121
jeantrounstine.com
Creator of the humanities-based theater arts program at Framingham Women’s Prison and author of Shakespeare Behind Bars, a memoir about teaching Shakespeare to women inmates; Changing Lives Through Literature, an anthology that uses contemporary literature to rehabilitate longtime offenders; Long Married, a collection of essays; and a collection of poems, Almost Home.
A gifted painter, writer, and teacher, Pam Bernard is ethical, humane, and inspiring in her approach. Her book of poems Blood Garden is a deeply felt and powerful touchstone for students and teachers interested in expanding their knowledge of the WWI conflagration, and offers readers an opening for discussion and writing about the wellspring of peace.
Judy P. Heitzman, Ed.D
Duxbury High School (Duxbury, Massachusetts) English teacher, 1975-2010
Author of Maybe Grace, poems
The poems are spare yet full, whittled to only the words that in themselves, and in combination, carry a weight of felt meaning. I was especially struck by the fine use of sound – as if this aspect of form had gathered itself around the depth and grit of the subject, in order to be its frame, in order to set it apart from itself at the same time as it remained itself, in order that it should enter us as music, that is to say beyond the reaches of plain words. As in this stanza where a German soldier nears home: At last, the familiar latch, / and at the top of the stairs, fragrance / of potato cakes, Mother and young Hilda / busy with Saturday cooking. A jar of whortleberries / squats on the worn wooden table.
Sue Chenette
Poet, teacher, classical pianist, author of four books of poetry
Often our students are exposed to war via Hollywood-style battle scenes. What is explosive about Pam Bernard's book is the reader's experience of living the war along side a seventeen year old New England boy. Through narrative and photographs, war takes its daily shape— sacrificing land, horses, and men. In addition, flashbacks to the boy's childhood on the farm serve as both a solace and a ringing reminder of the loss of innocence. Blood Garden is an extraordinary teaching device, a chance to counteract the sensationalism of the media's approach to war.
Sondra Upham
High School English teacher in Duxbury, MA for twenty-two years. MFA, UMass Boston. Author of Freight, poems.
My class, College Composition II, talked about what they learned from attending your reading and discussion, and how fortunate they were to have had the privilege of attending. Thank you so much.
Nancy Marashio
Liberal Arts Chair, River Valley Community College
The student comments:
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Liked the picture part, especially the shell shock one and the way her tone of voice made it like WOW – and the horse one, an aha one
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Obviously see how much research was involved and how it was integrated – we have talked about that but now I can see that
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Liked her including herself in her presentation too – we talked about I Search and now I see how research can include an I
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Glad she didn’t make it glorious because it’s not….she showed the “living hell on earth”
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That one picture stepping over bodies when she talks about the stench and the waste (on more than one level) stands out so much
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Made me feel better about modern technology of war in one way, because of the 8 million horses .. I know humans died but humans had some choices … animals didn’t …with modern technology we could at least prevent that part of war