Can poetry be hilarious? Bonnie Garmus’ ‘Lessons in Chemistry’ follow-up proves it

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From a young age, “Peck & Peck” protagonist and narrator Batter Gray is obsessed with poetry, an infatuation that doesn’t disturb his parents until he reveals that he plans to pursue a career in the field. “There isn’t a parent alive who wants their kid to grow up and be a poet,” Batter reflects. But by the time he enters high school, he’s already gone from “reading A.A. Milne to Bukowski,” and by 17, he’s pondering Sonnet #2 by Ted Berrigan, in awe of how Berrigan “subverted the form.” Now his parents are “worried in earnest.” His teachers remind him that nearly all the great poets had second jobs: “Robert Frost worked as a cobbler,” advises Mrs. Barksdale. “Walt Whitman was a clerk.” Batter remains undeterred.

“Peck & Peck” is Bonnie Garmus’ whimsical and winning ode to the written word, and send-up of the pretensions of its gatekeepers. Her 2022 critically acclaimed, hit debut novel, “Lessons in Chemistry” — later adapted into an Apple TV series starring Brie Larson — introduced Elizabeth Zott, an eccentric and brilliant scientist determined to get her due despite the patriarchy’s many efforts to keep her down.

“Peck & Peck” has little in common with that feminist anthem, but both share a classic underdog story of battling a culture that favors money, status and squeaky wheels. Garmus’ sophomore novel is more of a bildungsroman, the chronicle of a quietly observant boy who is certain of only one thing: that when it comes to poetry, he has perfect pitch. Not that he wants to be a poet: “I don’t want to write,” he confesses to his friend June, who, for practical reasons, has decided to become an insurance underwriter. What he aspires to — the way other kids dream of becoming baseball players or astronauts — is to unearth new voices in the medium: “I want to discover. Like the way Brian Epstein discovered the Beatles,” he says.

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“Peck & Peck” is the name of the eponymous poetry magazine Batter has idolized since boyhood, but it’s fallen on hard times. Declonius Peck, its beloved editor-in-chief, has gone to prison for embezzlement, and his evil twin, Salton, has assumed management of the family business, along with the 39 editors who curate the periodical. Their office building is a marvel of design and architecture — with aviaries and topiaries and mobiles in the shape of letterforms — but it is also a kind of fortress, with an armed guard named Andy positioned in the lobby to fend off poets desperate to be featured in the prestigious journal.

After graduating from college, Batter moves to New York, where he folds shirts at the Gap and busses tables at a restaurant named Just Okay. In between jobs, he attends poetry readings to keep himself in the game. One snowy night, he has a breakthrough: Batter stumbles upon the Peck & Peck building where he overhears that the company has an open position. Mysteriously, he gets the job, though it turns out to be at the very bottom of the ladder — as a copy boy confined to the basement. There he is insulted and snubbed by his supercilious editorial colleagues, with the exception of long-suffering Howard, who advises him that while a future promotion is out of the question, “photocopying is a very important job…take your work seriously and it will become serious work.” He’s also the first to alert Batter that, “In spite of its beauty and grace, the world of poetry publishing is cutthroat.” That point is proved time and again, as editors scheme against each other, belittle each other’s literary taste and throw Batter under the bus whenever an opportunity arises.

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In the first half of “Peck & Peck,” we learn that Batter has been named after a family dog whose superhero escapades were recounted in reverent tones throughout his childhood by his mother, Rainey. Even as a young boy, Batter is skeptical that a dog could, say, cheer up his young owner on Valentine’s Day by delivering a bouquet of flowers to her at school, or change the course of an 8-year-old’s life during the Great Depression by planting a $100 bill in his hand. Rainey is a type designer whose passion for her craft equals her son’s for his, and whose knowledge of typography will eventually itself prove heroic. “With the right typeface,” she imparts to Batter, “any poem can seem important. Even poems written by elephants.” Batter’s father, John, is a historian at a California community college. Among his fellow academics, John’s work in the field is the stuff of legends, a fact his son will only discover in years to come, as he learns to finally appreciate the extraordinary humans they are.

Author Bonnie Garmus. (Sophia Spring) It’s in the second half of the novel, after Batter graduates from college, that the plot gains momentum and begins to soar. It’s up to Batter to decide whether he will remain a passive character in his own story, or risk decisive action. Salton is devious and untrustworthy, but is Batter’s only clear path to a promotion. Declonius may be a convicted felon, but appears to be on the right side when it comes to poetry, a medium so essential to Batter’s makeup that he puts it this way: “It didn’t seem to matter what the topic was — love, war, hate, jealousy, crime, retribution, revenge, or reconciliation — the poets had it covered. And they provided actual answers.”

It’s also true that each of those elements figures into what unfolds as Salton and Declonius battle it out, especially in the case of Salton, who has always envied his brother and longs for retribution. The appearance of such characters as action star and “sexiest woman alive” Xing Xing, and winsome love interest Wren, thicken the plot. Oh, and if you didn’t think a novel set in the world of poetry could be comical, you’d be wrong. The repartee sparkles; the farcical touches lighten the tone. And the denouement! Let’s just say an expert witness’ thrilling take on typography is yet another unexpected twist in this thoroughly delightful tale.

As for Batter, he’s perhaps the best poetry ambassador to have ever graced the pages of a novel. I kept looking up poems he references as I turned the pages. A reader is hard-pressed to resist becoming a poetry stan, so persuasive is Garmus’ Batter. In her protagonist’s own words: “Poetry is problematic. First, it’s not easy. It forces you to think and sometimes thinking hurts. Also, poetry can make you feel stupid, like you don’t get it. And if you do get it, then it’s only because it just revealed something about yourself that you were hoping to keep hidden.”

Haber is a writer, editor and publishing strategist, and co-founder of the Ink Book Club on Substack. She was director of Oprah’s Book Club and books editor for O, the Oprah Magazine.

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