The Work of Poetry

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Columbia University Press, 1997 - 318 pages
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New and classic essays by one of America's most distinguished contemporary poet-critics, The Work of Poetry surveys an extraordinary range of poets, from Dante to May Swenson, and George Meredith to Marianne Moore, as well as works from the Psalms to A Child's Garden of Verses. By turns generous and uncompromising, Hollander champions the enduring force of poetry against the incursion of fashionable writing. This is an elegant, uncompromising affirmation of the extraordinary powers of poetic imagination from a poet whose poems have been hailed by J.D. McClatchy as "ways of thinking on paper."

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THE WORK OF POETRY

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Cautionary words about poetry from an idiosyncratic and surprising critic and poet. Hollander, usually regarded as a conservative observer of things poetic, both lives up to his reputation and defies ... Read full review

The work of poetry

User Review  - Not Available - Book Verdict

Hollander (English, Yale), a recipient of the Bollingen Prize in 1983 and a five-year MacArthur Fellowship, has written a treatise on poetry that would never be considered easy reading. Of course ... Read full review

Contents

Acknowledgments xi
One The Work of Poetry 3
Three A Poetry of Restitution 39
Four What You Mean by Home 64
Five Dreaming Poetry 78
The Poetics of a Preposition 96
Seven Hearing and Overhearing the Psalms 113
Eight On A Childs Garden of Verses 129
On Dante Gabriel Rossetti 190
Fourteen
viii
Trumbull
A Late Appreciation 235
Robert Penn
Twentyone Elizabeth Bishops Mappings of Life 280
Some Remarks

Ten Discovering Wallace Stevens 152
Eleven O Heavy Verse The Shopwork of the Workshops 160
Contents
Index 307
Copyright

Other editions - View all

The Work of Poetry
John Hollander
Limited preview - 1997
The Work of Poetry
John Hollander
Limited preview - 1997
The Work of Poetry
John Hollander
No preview available - 1997

Common terms and phrases

American appeared become beginning called central chapter comes complex consider continuing course criticism death dream earlier early echo English epigram example Experiences feel fiction figure final give hand hear human imagination important instance interpretation kind language late later leaves less light lines literal literary literature lives look matter mean merely metaphor mode moral moves nature never observe once opening original particular past pattern perhaps phrase play poem poet poetic poetry present Press Psalm question reader relation remains remarkable remember revision rhetorical rhyme River Robert seems sense song sonnet sort sound speak stanza starts story strange things thought tion translation trope true turn University verse vision voice wonderful writing written young

About the author (1997)

John Hollander has edited several Everyman's Library Pocket Poet volumes, including "Robert Frost", "Christmas Poems", "War Poems", "Marriage Poems", "Animal Poems", & "Garden Poems". He is the A. Bartlett Biamatti Professor of English at Yale University, & the author of numerous books of poetry & criticism. He was made a MacArthur Fellow in 1990.

Bibliographic information

QR code for The Work of Poetry
TitleThe Work of Poetry
AuthorJohn Hollander
PublisherColumbia University Press, 1997
ISBN0231108966, 9780231108966
Length318 pages
  
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