American poetry
When she was good…
In June 1957, Robert Lowell attended a poetry reading by E.E. Cummings. Sitting dutifully and deferentially alongside him were Allen…
Poet on the brink
‘A matter that hurts me is that I have made many hundreds of people laugh, in various cities, during the…
The poet of self-discovery
To describe a new book as ‘eagerly awaited’ is almost unpardonable. Yet Mark Doty’s What is the Grass: Walt Whitman…
Muses, nurses and punch-bags
The conceit of this book — the author’s third on Robert Lowell — is strong, although its execution is less…
The maiden aunt of modernism
Marianne Moore’s poems are notoriously ‘difficult’ but her personality and the circumstances of her life are as fascinating today as…
