Poets, Poetics, and Politics: America's Literary Community Viewed from the Letters of Rolfe Humphries, 1910-1969 - Hardcover

Gillman, Richard

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0700605088 ISBN 13: 9780700605088

Publisher: Univ Pr of Kansas, 1992

Synopsis

Rolfe Humphries (1894-1969), in addition to being an outstanding poet, left an impressive trail as a translator, teacher, critic, and editor. But, as Richard Gillman maintains in the introduction to this volume, poetry was the driving force behind these other special skills and interests. Humphries was, Gillman writes, an example of "the total poet. . . . If ever there were poets who did in fact breathe their art, he was one of them."
These letters for the first time illumine Humphries and his achievements. We see him as the mentor to younger poets including Theodore Roethke, providing rare glimpses of poetics and the creative process; the teacher so charmed by horseracing he sometimes "put an exam on the blackboard . . . and then bugged out for the track"; the "literary terrorist" whose criticism Robert Frost never forgot and probably never forgave him for; the translator whose Aeneid prompted W. H. Auden to call it "a service for which no public reward could be too great"; the author of an introduction to Ezra Pound's poems who demanded that a reference to his anti-Semitism be deleted. And so on and on, in all of Humphries' surprising variety and unfailing candor.
Active in America's literary community, Humphries was a friend of many poets and writers, including Louise Bogan, Edmund Wilson, and Roethke. This volume takes on added meaning by completing the published account of the relationships of these four as already told by Roethke, Bogan, and, to a lesser extent, Wilson.
Poets, Poetics, and Politics is set in a period that opened just two years before the birth of Harriet Monroe's Poetry; when it closed, most of the twentieth century's literary giants had died. Also in this time, many writers, Humphries included, dreamed the dreams of communism; his letters on this subject are both informative and absorbing.

About this title

About the Author

Richard Gillman is the author of Too Much Alone and Lunch at Carcassonne.

Michael Paul Novak is the author of The Leavenworth Poems, Sailing by the Whirlpool, and A Story to Tell.

From the Back Cover

"Captivating. . . . Humphries' letters open a window onto the literary world of Theodore Roethke, Louise Bogan, Edmund Wilson, and other important American writers."--Jay Parini, author of The Last Station and Theodore Roethke: An American Romantic

"The letters are often pungent and flavorful."--George H. Douglas, author of six books and editor of seven, including Edmund Wilson's America

Reviews

These candid, argumentative letters from poet/translator Rolfe Humphries (1894-1969) to Theodore Roethke, Louise Bogan, Edmund Wilson, Malcolm Cowley, James Laughlin and other writers reveal a man of paradox. Crafter of finely made, sensitive, modest lyrics, classics scholar Humphries had fervent, dogmatic communist sympathies in the 1930s and outspokenly campaigned against Hitler and fascism. Translator of Ovid, Virgil, Lucretius, Martial and Garcia Lorca, he filled his own poems and letters with an offbeat mix of American vernacular and classical simplicity. Son of a pro baseball player turned classics scholar, Humphries discussed poetic techniques in terms of sports and penned offhand putdowns (of Emily Dickinson, he wrote, ``A lot of her work dribbles off into nothingness''). These high-energy letters illuminate his influence on Roethke, a protege, and his sparring relationship with Bogan. Poets Gillman ( Too Much Alone ) and Novak ( A Story to Tell ) both knew Humphries personally. Photos.

Copyright 1991 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Univ Pr of Kansas
• Publication date: 1992
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0700605088
• ISBN 13: 9780700605088
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 320
• Editor: Novak Michael Paul