This complete scholarly edition of the poems of Jones Very (1813-80) provides the requisite materials for a major reappraisal of his work and standing among the significant figures of American Transcendentalism. Collecting 862 poems, the volume makes available for the first time all of Very's known poems, including much previously unpublished or uncollected material. Very, a New England Transcendentalist and a protege of Ralph Waldo Emerson, is one of the underrated American poets of the nineteenth century. Though he attracted a select audience in his day, serious study of Very's work in this century has been hampered by the lack of a complete, convenient, and reliable edition of his poetry. Perhaps even more discouraging to readers of older collections of Very's poems has been the puzzling variance in the style and quality of the verse. This edition, in which the poems are dated and chronologically arranged, reveals the three stages of Very's poetic development, out of which the distinctive genius of the second period clearly emerges. Written under the influence of a powerful psychological/spiritual experience, the ecstatic utterances of this period are by turns breathless in their intensity and tranquil in their serene contentment. This complete edition presents a critical, unmodernized, clear-text version of each poem, reflecting as nearly as possible the author's final intention. A textual introduction outlines editorial procedures and problems, and a general introduction places Very among his contemporaries, discusses the mystical experience that transformed his life and poetry, reviews the major related criticism, and assesses his poetic achievements. Historical notes and a full textual apparatus complete the edition.

Robert Lowell is one of the most widely recognised and influential poets of the second half of this century. Yet his career is problematical and raises many questions about direction and quality, particularly in light of his repeated reorientation of thematic concern and poetic technique. Many previous studies of the poet have accounted for these radical differences in Lowell's work by examining the poet's private life, but this collection of essays attempts to reassess Lowell's poetry and to restimulate critical thinking about it by focusing on his texts to raise new questions and discussions about the work. The twelve essays in this volume, by many of the most distinguished scholars in the field, offer a chronological review of Robert Lowell's career as a poet. The book includes pieces on major works such as Lord Weary's Castle, Life Studies, For the Union Dead, 'Skunk Hour', Notebook, the sonnets of 1969-73 as well as four essays devoted to Lowell's last complete and often neglected work, Day by Day. Employing a variety of methodologies, the essays arrive at innovative and, often, controversial interpretations of Lowell's poems.