Author Description
Peter Robinson's third book of literary criticism presents a sequence of chapters exploring ways that selves and situations interact and become imaginatively identified with each other in poems. Readings of works by Ezra Pound, Basil Bunting, Louis MacNeice, W. S. Graham, Elizabeth Bishop, Allen Curnow, Charles Tomlinson, Mairi MacInnes, Tom Raworth, and Roy Fisher share an interest in how poems can be both attached to, and detached from, the culture, society, and conditions in which they were written. These studies draw out and underline both the ubiquity and elusiveness of the self in the situation of the text. The poems studied here are also discussed as focal points for relations between readerly and writerly selves and their situations in and over time.
Menrva's Summary
THE THESIS
This book investigates the complex interplay between the poetic self and the situational context within twentieth-century verse. Peter M. Robinson, a scholar of modern poetry, utilizes a series of close readings to examine how individual identity is constructed and reflected within the constraints of specific cultural and social environments. The work argues that poems serve as critical sites where the boundaries between the author's internal self and the external world are negotiated and redefined.
THE SCOPE MAP
What You Will Find
- Analysis of works by Ezra Pound, Basil Bunting, Louis MacNeice, W. S. Graham, Elizabeth Bishop, Allen Curnow, Charles Tomlinson, Mairi MacInnes, Tom Raworth, and Roy Fisher.
- A theoretical framework exploring the tension between poetic attachment and detachment from cultural conditions.
- Examination of the relationship between readerly and writerly selves over time.
Scope Limits
- The text focuses primarily on the selected poets and does not provide a comprehensive survey of all twentieth-century poetic movements.
- It does not offer a broad historical timeline but rather thematic case studies.
THE AUTHORITY PERSPECTIVE
Scholars and students of modern literature frequently identify this text as a nuanced contribution to the study of poetic subjectivity and context. Readers often note the academic density of the prose, which is intended for those already familiar with the specific poets discussed.
Page Count:
296
Publication Date:
2005-01-01
Publisher:
OUP Oxford
ISBN-10:
019153420X
ISBN-13:
9780191534201
Poetry
Literary Criticism
Academic
English & College Success
Literary theory
English
Poetry
Twentieth Century
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