Constructions of Europe in Modern American Poetry - (Modern American Literature and the New Twentieth Century) by Elin Käck (Hardcover)

About the Book

Examines how twentieth-century American poets' European travel shaped the terrain of modern American poetry.

Book Synopsis

American poets were at the core of the modernist movement, a position largely contingent on their being in Europe. But what role has European travel played in the development of American poetry since then? Constructions of Europe in Modern American Poetry examines poems and other writings by over twenty American poets, focusing especially on the modernist moment and the postwar generation. This rich material reveals the foundational role that poets' travels in and to Europe have had on the development of American poetry, from the ways the modernists tackled tradition to the postwar poets' reckoning with their modernist precursors in Europe's places. European travel lays bare anxieties about the conflation of the roles of poet and tourist and is intimately connected to issues of poetic legitimacy and belatedness.

Review Quotes

Luminous and brilliantly researched: this is a grand tour of American poets struggling with Europe's imaginary holds. The obscure object of desire in Käck's study is less a fixed subject than a haunting map, less Western literary tradition than the fleeting possibilities of non-nativist poetics. Watch these literary Ahabs in hot pursuit of new forms for ever changing lines.--Charles Bernstein, University of Pennsylvania

The complex response of American poets of the twentieth century to 'Europe' - a name replete with allusions and symbolism - is a marvelous topic. This will be a book not just for specialists but for anyone interested in American reactions to Europe. There is so much talk of the Eurocentric these days and this clarifies the issue beautifully.--Marjorie Perloff, Stanford University