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Mary of Egypt

In John Berryman's Pulitzer Prize winning book of poetry The Dream Songs, poem 47, subtitled "April Fool's Day, or, St. Mary of Egypt," recounts Mary of Egypt's walk across the River Jordan.

The Dream Songs

Kevin Young, an African-American poet who edited a Selected Poems of Berryman for Library of America, commented on this issue: Berryman's use of "black dialect" is frustrating and even offensive at times, as many have noted, and deserves examination at length.

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Upon its publication, the book also received a positive review in The New York Times Book Review by the literary scholar Helen Vendler.

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