Poetry Book Club: "The Near and Distant World" by Bianca Stone

This monthly book club, led by Doug Knowlton, is for those who like to read and discuss poetry. It celebrates the integral role of poets and poetry in life and literature. May's selection is The Near and Distant World by Bianca Stone - a vivid, enthralling new collection of poems from the Vermont Poet Laureate and award-winning author of What is Otherwise Infinite.

We meet in person in the loft of our store in The Mark building at 117 South Pineapple Avenue. The cost is your purchase of the book ($8), which can be picked up at Bookstore1 any time before our meeting.

ABOUT THE BOOK:

In her latest, brilliant collection, Bianca Stone continues to explore and interrogate the full spectrum of life, from an unexpectedly intimate conversation with an internet technician in Brooklyn, to a deep dive into Greek mythology, psychoanalysis, and modern philosophy. “I am thinking of what it means to be alive in this world,” Stone muses, “I want to get it not right but near.” With her signature incisive perspective, Stone debates the paradoxes of finding one’s own self amid parenthood, global change, and the constant press of mortality.
In these fifty-one poems, Stone seamlessly ties together allusions to Jordan Peele’s Nope, Rilke’s elegies, and other cultural touchstones to arrive at new revelations. With fluidity and wryness, she brings readers to the brink of psychic wounds, operatic dramas, and strange dreams, with a fresh narrative in the rich mytho-poetic tradition.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

BIANCA STONE is a Vermont-based poet and scholar currently serving as Vermont’s poet laureate. Stone is the author of many books, including the poetry collections What is Otherwise Infinite which received the 2022 Vermont Book Award, and The Near and Distant World, (Tin House in January, 2026). Her poetry and writings have appeared widely in such magazines as The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Poets and Writers, and The Nation. In 2013 she co-founded the poetry-based nonprofit, Ruth Stone House, where she organizes events and retreats, teaches classes on poetry and poetic study, hosts the

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