Poets Thinking

Poets Thinking PDF Author: Helen Vendler
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674044622
Category : Poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 155

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Book Description
Poetry has often been considered an irrational genre, more expressive than logical, more meditative than given to coherent argument. And yet, in each of the four very different poets she considers here, Helen Vendler reveals a style of thinking in operation; although they may prefer different means, she argues, all poets of any value are thinkers. The four poets taken up in this volume--Alexander Pope, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, and William Butler Yeats--come from three centuries and three nations, and their styles of thinking are characteristically idiosyncratic. Vendler shows us Pope performing as a satiric miniaturizer, remaking in verse the form of the essay, Whitman writing as a poet of repetitive insistence for whom thinking must be followed by rethinking, Dickinson experimenting with plot to characterize life's unfolding, and Yeats thinking in images, using montage in lieu of argument. With customary lucidity and spirit, Vendler traces through these poets' lines to find evidence of thought in lyric, the silent stylistic measures representing changes of mind, the condensed power of poetic thinking. Her work argues against the reduction of poetry to its (frequently well-worn) themes and demonstrates, instead, that there is always in admirable poetry a strenuous process of thinking, evident in an evolving style--however ancient the theme--that is powerful and original.

Poets Thinking

Poets Thinking PDF Author: Helen Vendler
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674044622
Category : Poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 155

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Book Description
Poetry has often been considered an irrational genre, more expressive than logical, more meditative than given to coherent argument. And yet, in each of the four very different poets she considers here, Helen Vendler reveals a style of thinking in operation; although they may prefer different means, she argues, all poets of any value are thinkers. The four poets taken up in this volume--Alexander Pope, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, and William Butler Yeats--come from three centuries and three nations, and their styles of thinking are characteristically idiosyncratic. Vendler shows us Pope performing as a satiric miniaturizer, remaking in verse the form of the essay, Whitman writing as a poet of repetitive insistence for whom thinking must be followed by rethinking, Dickinson experimenting with plot to characterize life's unfolding, and Yeats thinking in images, using montage in lieu of argument. With customary lucidity and spirit, Vendler traces through these poets' lines to find evidence of thought in lyric, the silent stylistic measures representing changes of mind, the condensed power of poetic thinking. Her work argues against the reduction of poetry to its (frequently well-worn) themes and demonstrates, instead, that there is always in admirable poetry a strenuous process of thinking, evident in an evolving style--however ancient the theme--that is powerful and original.

Poetry Review

Poetry Review PDF Author: Stephen Phillips
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 446

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Book Description


Poetry

Poetry PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 348

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Book Description


Poet and Hero in the Persian Book of Kings

Poet and Hero in the Persian Book of Kings PDF Author: Olga M. Davidson
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 1501733974
Category : Poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 217

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Book Description
A masterpiece of Persian Classical epic, the Shahnama or Book of Kings was composed by Abu'l-Qasem Ferdowsi at the beginning of the eleventh century. Because the Shahnama presents itself as a chronicle of the reigns of the shahs from the primordial founders to the Sasanian dynasty which ended in 651, scholarly attention has centered on the question of its historical accuracy. Addressing the literary as well as the historical and mythological aspects of the Shahnama, Olga M. Davidson makes this centerpiece of Iranian culture accessible to Western readers. Drawing on recent work in epic studies and oral poetics, Davidson considers analogies with Classical and medieval European narratives as she investigates the poem's social contexts. Her interpretation of the Shahnama focuses on both the figure of the poet himself and on his protagonists-the superhuman hero Rostam and the historical or historicized shahs. Exploring the Shahnama as an example of court poetry designed to glorify the idea of empire, Davidson identifies as a driving force of Ferdowsi's narrative a strong current of antagonism between king and hero. Ironically, she shows, it is the epic hero himself who poses the greatest threat to the concept of kingship that he is sworn to defend. Poet and Hero in the Persian Book of Kings will be welcomed by readers working in such fields as comparative literature, Middle Eastern Studies, folklore, literary theory, and comparative religion.

Coming of Age as a Poet

Coming of Age as a Poet PDF Author: Helen Vendler
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674010246
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 198

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Book Description
With characteristic precision, authority, and grace, Vendler helps readers to appreciate the conception and practice of poetry as she explores four poets and their first "perfect" works. 4 halftones.

International Who's Who in Poetry 2004

International Who's Who in Poetry 2004 PDF Author: Europa Publications
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 9781857431780
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 536

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Book Description
Provides up-to-date profiles on the careers of leading and emerging poets.

Poet-Critics and the Administration of Culture

Poet-Critics and the Administration of Culture PDF Author: Evan Kindley
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674981634
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 175

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Book Description
The period between 1920 and 1950 saw an epochal shift in the American cultural economy. The shocks of the 1929 market crash and the Second World War decimated much of the support for high modernist literature, and writers who had relied on wealthy benefactors were forced to find new protectors from the depredations of the free market. Private foundations, universities, and government organizations began to fund the arts, and in this environment writers were increasingly obliged to become critics, elucidating and justifying their work to an audience of elite administrators. In Poet-Critics and the Administration of Culture, Evan Kindley recognizes the major role modernist poet-critics played in the transition from aristocratic patronage to technocratic cultural administration. Poet-critics developed extensive ties to a network of bureaucratic institutions and established dual artistic and intellectual identities to appeal to the kind of audiences and entities that might support their work. Kindley focuses on Anglo-American poet-critics including T. S. Eliot, Marianne Moore, W. H. Auden, Archibald MacLeish, Sterling A. Brown, and R. P. Blackmur. These artists grappled with the task of being “village explainers” (as Gertrude Stein described Ezra Pound) and legitimizing literature for public funding and consumption. Modernism, Kindley shows, created a different form of labor for writers to perform and gave them an unprecedented say over the administration of contemporary culture. The consequences for our understanding of poetry and its place in our culture are still felt widely today.

Sweet Velocity

Sweet Velocity PDF Author: Rachel Moritz
Publisher: Lost Roads Publishers
ISBN: 9780918786647
Category : American poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Poetry. LGBTQIA Studies. Rachel Moritz's powerfully sweet SWEET VELOCITY delivers a lived-in world--material, object- oriented and also lyrically distinctive. The song here treats a serene, sometimes bemused, engagement with life passages--the essentials of coming into and going out of the world, of bringing about and of letting go. But Moritz's song, like the Dickinsonian one, also abrades the conventions it observes. Poetry is the result. An eccentric system. "[S]tops of flow before the animal."

The English Catalogue of Books

The English Catalogue of Books PDF Author: Sampson Low
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : English literature
Languages : en
Pages : 676

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Book Description
Vols. for 1898-1968 include a directory of publishers.

The Works of the English Poets, from Chaucer to Cowper

The Works of the English Poets, from Chaucer to Cowper PDF Author: Alexander Chalmers
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : English poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 564

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Book Description