Anne Carson'' s first full-length publication in Britain, Glass and God introduces an assured and challenging new voice: vivid, laconic, precise. Her ''Short Talks'' are about everything from Sylvia Plath to Franz Kafka, from waterproofing to walking backwards; the brilliant long poem ''The Glass Essay'' deals with the end of a contemporary love affair, but is haunted by the Brontë sisters.

Blending the modern and the classical, Anne Carson writes with an intensity and an integrity that is transfiguring.