The New American Poetry, 1945-1960 Book

For me, this is where my reading & writing of poetry began. It's not just the poets represented here (Olson, Blackburn, Creeley, Duncan, Spicer, etc.), but the poems selected, which, frankly, seems to be a lost art. There have been numerous anthologies published since, some with even more impressive lineups, but they lack the selectivity of works that this anthology epitomized. The poems selected for Olson really highlight what was revolutionary in his thought; The Kingfishers, The Lordly & Isolate Satyrs, The Distances. All three great poems, all three truly projective, and all three poems so compelling that I still re-read them to this day. The Duncan selection includes Poem Beginning With A Line by Pindar, which is easily one of his best & brightest. Dorn's The Hide of My Mother presages his most sarcastic works, but with an inner view which his late works avoid. Could have done better with Levertov & Blaser, but a stunning selection of Lamantia poems, leading off with Terror Conduction, which makes the hair stand on end. 12 choruses from Kerouac's fabulous Mexico City Blues, Parts 1 & II of Howl, Sunflower Sutra, Corso's Marraige, all exemplary works from what was to become the beat canon. The NY School could have been more illuminating, but Koch's Thank You rocks, and O'Hara's whole selection is utterly mind-blowing. These are still my favorite O'Hara poems. Ashbery's Instruction Manual is still used in workshops (because it is so perfect), and How Long Will I Be Able To Inhabit the Divine Sepulchre is one of the flarfiest Ashbery poems I know of. Nice Whalen selections, and Snyder's Riprap sort of round out that scene. The John Weiners poems are so intense & burning that I remember not being able to forget them, still. Then closing out with some essays, like Olson's Projective Verse and the like, this book was absolutely crucial for me & many others. I constituted my first reading lists from this book. I don't think I could possibly recommend it enough. Does it have shortcomings? You bet. Very few women, it's missing Ted Berrigan (who wasn't publishing much at the time, but came to be so much a part of this mileu), maybe not enough Barbara Guest, but even so, a masterpiece.