Hart Crane

After His Lights

Fiction & Literature, Literary Theory & Criticism, Poetry History & Criticism
Cover of the book Hart Crane by Brian M. Reed, University of Alabama Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Brian M. Reed ISBN: 9780817382926
Publisher: University of Alabama Press Publication: September 15, 2009
Imprint: University Alabama Press Language: English
Author: Brian M. Reed
ISBN: 9780817382926
Publisher: University of Alabama Press
Publication: September 15, 2009
Imprint: University Alabama Press
Language: English

A critical reassessment of the life’s work of a major American poet.

 

With his suicide in 1932, Hart Crane left behind a small body of work—White Buildings (1926) and The Bridge (1930). Yet, Crane’s poetry was championed and debated publicly by many of the most eminent literary and cultural critics of his day, among them Van Wyck Brooks, Kenneth Burke, Robert Graves, Allen Tate, and Edmund Wilson. The Bridge appears in its entirety in the Norton Anthology of American Literature, and Crane himself has been the subject two recent biographies.

In Hart Crane: After His Lights, Brian Reed undertakes a study of Crane’s poetic output that takes into account, but also questions, the post-structural and theoretical developments in humanities scholarship of the last decade that have largely approached Crane in a piecemeal way, or pigeonholed him as represen-tative of his class, gender, or sexual orientation. Reed examines Crane’s career from his juvenilia to his posthumous critical reception and his impact on practicing poets following World War II. The first part of the study tests common rubrics of literary theory—nationality, sexuality, period—against Crane’s poetry, and finds that these labels, while enlightening, also obfuscate the origin and character of the poet’s work. The second part examines Crane’s poetry through the process of its composition, sources, and models, taking up questions of style, genealogy, and genre. The final section examines Crane’s influence on subsequent generations of American poets, especially by avant-garde literary circles like the New American poets, the Black Mountain School, the New York School, and the Beats.

The result is a study that complicates and enriches our understandings of Crane’s poetry and contributes to the ongoing reassessment of literary modernism’s origins, course, and legacy.
 

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

A critical reassessment of the life’s work of a major American poet.

 

With his suicide in 1932, Hart Crane left behind a small body of work—White Buildings (1926) and The Bridge (1930). Yet, Crane’s poetry was championed and debated publicly by many of the most eminent literary and cultural critics of his day, among them Van Wyck Brooks, Kenneth Burke, Robert Graves, Allen Tate, and Edmund Wilson. The Bridge appears in its entirety in the Norton Anthology of American Literature, and Crane himself has been the subject two recent biographies.

In Hart Crane: After His Lights, Brian Reed undertakes a study of Crane’s poetic output that takes into account, but also questions, the post-structural and theoretical developments in humanities scholarship of the last decade that have largely approached Crane in a piecemeal way, or pigeonholed him as represen-tative of his class, gender, or sexual orientation. Reed examines Crane’s career from his juvenilia to his posthumous critical reception and his impact on practicing poets following World War II. The first part of the study tests common rubrics of literary theory—nationality, sexuality, period—against Crane’s poetry, and finds that these labels, while enlightening, also obfuscate the origin and character of the poet’s work. The second part examines Crane’s poetry through the process of its composition, sources, and models, taking up questions of style, genealogy, and genre. The final section examines Crane’s influence on subsequent generations of American poets, especially by avant-garde literary circles like the New American poets, the Black Mountain School, the New York School, and the Beats.

The result is a study that complicates and enriches our understandings of Crane’s poetry and contributes to the ongoing reassessment of literary modernism’s origins, course, and legacy.
 

More books from University of Alabama Press

Cover of the book Transitions by Brian M. Reed
Cover of the book Silence and Song by Brian M. Reed
Cover of the book Experience by Brian M. Reed
Cover of the book Life and Death in the Ancient City of Teotihuacan by Brian M. Reed
Cover of the book Unknown Waters by Brian M. Reed
Cover of the book The Great War in the Heart of Dixie by Brian M. Reed
Cover of the book A Century of Controversy by Brian M. Reed
Cover of the book My War against the Nazis by Brian M. Reed
Cover of the book Opening the Doors by Brian M. Reed
Cover of the book What I Say by Brian M. Reed
Cover of the book Rabbi Max Heller by Brian M. Reed
Cover of the book Show Us How You Do It by Brian M. Reed
Cover of the book Revelation Countdown by Brian M. Reed
Cover of the book Rhetorical Education In America by Brian M. Reed
Cover of the book Land of Water, City of the Dead by Brian M. Reed
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy