American Objectivist Poetry Across the 20th Century

American Objectivist Poetry Across the 20th Century cover

Description

Offering a new introduction to an important yet often overlooked group of 20th century American poets, this book re-examines their work as a group while giving special attention to their individual trajectories.

Objectivist poets' contribution to American literary history is no longer secret, but the nature of that specific contribution remains surprisingly unclear, and in need of serious revision. Through a range of perceptive close readings, this book offers a detailed assessment of this group-Lorine Niedecker, George Oppen, Carl Rakosi, Charles Reznikoff and Louis Zukofsky-from the 1930s Modernist era to the New American Poetry of the 1950s, all the way to the experimentations of the late 1970s and early 1980s. In doing so, it presents a new critical history of 20th century American poetry and how to engage with it.

Table of Contents

Introduction

1: Charles Reznikoff's Human Language
2: Forgetting Louis Zukofsky
3: The Scales of Carl Rakosi
4: Lorine Niedecker, Anchored and Abstract
5: George Oppen at the Lighthouse
Conclusion: Unreconciled Particulars
Bibliography
Index

Product details

Bloomsbury Academic Test
Published 11 Dec 2025
Format Ebook (PDF)
Edition 1st
Extent 224
ISBN 9781350419483
Imprint Bloomsbury Academic
Series Bloomsbury Studies in Critical Poetics
Publisher Bloomsbury Publishing

About the contributors

Author

Xavier Kalck

Xavier Kalck is Professor of North American Litera…

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