‘Mary Oliver: Saved by the Beauty of the World’ Review

Few modern poets are as readily quotable — and indeed as widely quoted — as Mary Oliver, the late Pulitzer winner whose graceful but plainly worded reflections on the natural world have been taken to heart by millions as mantras for a calmer, more mindful way of life. Depending on who you talk to, that’s a testament to either the brilliance or the banality of her work. Precious few poets get the privilege of becoming vastly popular in their lifetime, but with that profile often comes pushback from certain corners of the literary world: a suspicion that any verse understood by so many can’t be all that profound. An appropriately accessible and open-hearted documentary on her life and legacy, Sasha Waters‘ “Mary Oliver: Saved by the Beauty of the World” doesn’t engage with such criticism at an academic level; it prefers to answer it with the emotive power of Oliver’s own words.

It does so upfront, opening on one of Oliver’s many celebrity admirers, Stephen Colbert, as he attempts to recite her most well-known poem, “The Summer Day.” Well before he gets to its famous closing lines (“Tell me, what is it you plan to do / with your one wild and precious life?”), he falters, tearily overcome with feeling. He’s hardly the first person to be made verklempt by a poem that has become a staple at wedding and funeral services alike: It’s the most crystalline example of Oliver’s ability to layer outwardly unremarkable everyday imagery, usually pulled from nature, with searching existential implications.

When reduced to decontextualized soundbites, however, Oliver’s words can sound pat or epigrammatic in ways that don’t necessarily reflect her philosophy — just see how many times her line “joy is not made to be a crumb” has been used and abused by food marketers and culinary influencers. Such are the perils of popularity, all the more ironic because Oliver never intended to be a populist. A private and reticent…