The Art of Poetry (Poets On Poetry) - Softcover

Koch, Kenneth

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0472066056 ISBN 13: 9780472066056

Publisher: University of Michigan Press, 1996

Synopsis

A charter member of the legendary New York School of poets that includes John Ashbery, Frank O'Hara, and James Schuyler, Kenneth Koch has become one of America's best known and best loved poets. His apt parodies and zany poetic conceits have earned him the distinction of being the funniest poet in America, and his extravagant imagination and knack for high hilarity have pleased generations of readers.

Here, in The Art of Poetry, Koch offers amusing and thought-provoking essays on the nature of the

poetic moment, from its heartfelt emergence in an elementary school classroom to its raucous display in a set of satirical cartoons drawn by the author. Also included are interviews with Allen Ginsberg and Jordan Davis in which Koch discusses a range of diverse topics, including literary criticism, French poetry, and Santa Claus. The Art of Poetry provides Koch's audience with not only the musings and mischievous thoughts of the poetic mind, but also the reflections of the most respected poetry teacher in America.

Kenneth Koch's other books include On the Great Atlantic Rainway: Selected Poems 1950-1988; Seasons on Earth, Days and Nights, The Art of Love, One Thousand Avant-Garde Plays, and One Train, for which he won the Bollingen Prize in American Poetry. He is Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University.

About this title

From the Back Cover

A strikingly original poet, Kenneth Koch has also been an equally inventive and radical writer about poetry. His critical work has mainly taken the form of poems about poetry and books about teaching the writing of poetry to schoolchildren. This is a creative and eminently active kind of criticism that forsakes theory for practice and that never leaves critical opinion unsupported by the energy and excitement of poetry itself.

About the Author

Kenneth Koch teaches at Columbia University.

About this edition

• Publisher: University of Michigan Press
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0472066056
• ISBN 13: 9780472066056
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 224