The Poet's Work: 29 Poets on the Origins and Practice of Their Art

"This anthology brings together essays by 20th-century poets on their own art: some concern themselves with its deep sources and ultimate justifications; others deal with technique, controversies among schools, the experience behind particular poems. The great Modernists of most countries are presented here Paul Val ry, Federico Garc a Lorca, Boris Pasternak, Fernando Pessoa, Eugenio Montale, Wallace Stevens as are a range of younger, less eminent figures from the English-speaking world: Seamus Heaney, Denise Levertov, Wendell Berry. . . . The reader will find here a lively debate over the individualistic and the communal ends served by poetry, and over other issues that divide poets: inspiration and craft; the use or the condemnation of science; traditional and 'organic' form." Alan Williamson, New York Times Book Review