Male poets and the agon of the mother : contexts in confessional and postconfessional poetry / Hannah Baker Saltmarsh ; foreword by Jo Gill.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Saltmarsh, Hannah Baker, author.

Contributor:

Gill, Jo, 1965- writer of foreword.

Anne and Joseph Trachtman Memorial Book Fund.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Men and literature.

History.

United States.

American poetry--20th century--History and criticism.

American poetry.

Mothers and sons in literature.

Motherhood in literature.

Confession in literature.

Men and literature--United States--History--20th century.

Genre:

Criticism, interpretation, etc.

History.

Physical Description:

xv, 228 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Columbia, South Carolina : The University of South Carolina Press, [2019]

Summary:

"When looking back today on the American poetry of the second half of the twentieth century, we see that for many of the major--and still dominant--poets of the period, the confessional mode was a vital force. It made--and, of course, was shaped by--Robert Lowell, whose 1959 Life Studies prompted the delineation of the style. It galvanized Sylvia Plath, sustained Anne Sexton, and provided a useful countertradition even for those who never identified themselves as "confessional" (most obviously Elizabeth Bishop). It also proved fundamental to the careers of many poets of the next generation (including Thom Gunn and Sharon Olds)--even as such successors to the original "school" spent much of their time resisting, or at least rethinking, the terms of the debate"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Introduction: "At the center of how I think my life": my mother

"And, moreover / my mother says": Robert Lowell, John Berryman, and confessional maternity

"Freaked in the moon brain": Allen Ginsberg and Frank Bidart: confessing crazy mothers

Postconfessional stories: C.K. Williams and Robert Hass on maternal breasts and mouths

"Yellow flowers ... with mouths like where / babies come from": Yusef Komunyakaa's innuendos, ideas, and insinuations about motherhood

"And all this time I've stayed awake with you": romanticism in Stanley Plumly's maternal metaphor

"I am made by her, and undone": an Anglo-American coda; or, Thom Gunn undone

Conclusion: "You still haven't finished with your mother": men constructing a poetics of motherhood.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 205-220) and index.

Local Notes:

Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the Anne and Joseph Trachtman Memorial Book Fund.

Other Format:

Online version: Saltmarsh, Hannah Baker. Male poets and the agon of the mother.

ISBN:

9781611179682

1611179688

OCLC:

1065979399