Soon after the Revolution certain other characters were thus briefly drawn-struck off like so many new coins in a visionary moment. The outline was not filled in or given variations. This sketch remained fresh and pertinent for at least two generations. At nine in the morning their lusty program began again. At four they went home, dressed, had dinner, and were at the play at seven after the play, which they vastly enjoyed, they went to supper, where they sang and roared and smoked and drank until dawn. All day long they heaved, and hallooed, turning at intervals to scribble at their desks. They hated us for the same reason.TOWARD the end of the eighteenth century a genial foreign traveler told of some New York merchants who reached their counting-house by nine in the morning, donned aprons, and rolled hogsheads of rum and molasses around their wharves and were as dirty as their own porters, and could easily be mistaken for them. In these cases, both versions are printed within their respective collections. On occasion, revisions were so significant they effectively constituted an entirely new poem. In poems that Pittman revised for later publication, the last published versions are included in deference to his final vision, but they are placed within their original sequence. Typographical errors have been corrected, but every effort has been made to preserve the poems as they originally appeared. This book brings together all of Pittman's published poems, from his six full-length collections, in a single volume. But a significant portion of his life's work has been all but unavailable to readers for much of the last forty years, and a complete retrospective has been frustrated until now. Once When I Was Drowning included new poetry alongside selected poems from Pittman's first three collections, many of them printed in revised forms. His reputation and his influence have, to this point, rested almost entirely on the material in his last three books- Once When I Was Drowning (1978), Dancing in Limbo (1993), and Thirty-for-Sixty (1999). EDITOR’S NOTEĪl Pittman published his first three books of poetry between 19, but those early books have long been out of print. The editor and Breakwater Books extend their gratitude to Marilee Pittman for her assistance in the compilation and publication of Al Pittman’s collected poems.
Dancing in Limbo appeared in 1993 from Breakwater, and his final collection, Thirty-for-Sixty, was published by Breakwater in 1999. In 1978, Breakwater published Once When I Was Drowning, a collection of new and selected poems drawn from his earlier books, which by that time were out of print. His third collection of poetry, Through One More Window, was published by Breakwater in 1974 and incorporated drawings by Gerry Squires. Seaweed and Rosaries appeared in 1968, published by Poverty Press (Montreal, QC), and included illustrations by Kenneth Pittman. Al Pittman’s first book, The Elusive Resurrection, was published by Brunswick Press (Fredericton, NB) in 1966 with a foreword by Fred Cogswell.
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