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Brooks Roddan's review of 'Rommel Drives on Deep into Egypt'
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Come Home, Richard Brautigan

by Brooks Roddan?

Richard Brautigan may yet turn into the Rod McKuen of the hip set. I'm afraid his latest book of poems, Rommel Drives On Deep Into Egypt, is a cloying, cute, half-assed collection of rather uninteresting tripe.

The witty, groovy, mellow Brautigan of Trout Fishing and Watermelon Sugar' only appears in flashes. Nowhere are poems of caliber and substance of, say, "The Galilee Hitch-Hiker" to be found. Instead, short, sentimental drivel and boring reminiscences are contained. One of Brautigan's previous fortes had been turning the small into the cosmic, the cosmic into the small, but most of 'Rommel'' is already at its lowest common denominator. Two of the poems just have titles, no substance—I would rather have no titles and a little poetry.

Some of the Brautigan magic survives. He is still beautiful with a metaphor and simile. Witness: "too many times she slept like/a mechanical deer in my caresses/and I ached in the metal silence/of her dreams." When his word choice rhythm succeeds it is a sound and a feel very akin to rock and roll music.

But the contrived cleverness rips the occasional joy away. Maybe I'm picking on all the wrong things, but when a poet must rely on a title for the success of a poem, something is wrong, and too many of Brautigan's do just that. Most of these poems are all flash, the summer of '67 acid and flowers all over again. There is no over-riding purpose or integrity that a book like Watermelon Sugar had. Perhaps Brautigan is more at home writing short stories, and poetry is more or less a diversionary trip.

I still love R.B., and as one who awaits anything new from him as eagerly as rock freaks await a new album from the Beatles or Stones, I'll try to get into Rommel. I understand that he is busily working on a collection of short stories that are gonna blow a few minds. Rommel is a disappointment. Come on home, Richard, and get the hell out of Egypt.


Los Angeles Free Press?, 7(22)
May 29, 1970: 36.



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