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The Harvill Book of Twentieth-century Poetry in English (Harvill Press Editions)
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| List Price: | £15.00 |
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Product Description
A collection of poetry in English by more than 100 20th-century poets. It reveals the seismic shifts and conflicting spirits of the age, from the modified romanticism of the Georgians, to the tragedy of AIDS; from the rage of World War II poets, to the drug-induced poetics of the 1960s.
Product Details
- Amazon Sales Rank: #301265 in Books
- Published on: 2000-04-20
- Original language: English
- Binding: Paperback
- 728 pages
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.co.uk Review
In general, there are two kinds of 20th-century poetry anthology: the "chocolate box" and the "assault course." The first is an unashamed collection of much-loved soft centres, full of popular writers like Larkin and Hardy, and not afraid of comic or light verse. The second, by contrast, ascribes to the idea that poetry should be uplifting, or challenging. You might find the odd bit of Betjeman, but it's usually lost amid swathes of alienation from mid-century modernists such as John Berryman and Christopher Middleton. Struggling through the second kind of anthology tends to feel like the mental equivalent of a SAS induction weekend.
So where does this mighty tome fit in? To judge by the editor's introduction, this should be a rather daunting compendium. A bit of a bigwig in British poetry circles, Schmidt is an unabashed modernist, the kind of highbrow admirer of lines such as: "The glories of the world struck me, made me aria, once--What happens the, Mr Bones?" (Berryman), or: "Throaty owls also, they could entertain / Quick sensile teeth. / A joy. / Pelican moonlit." (Middleton).
Once you've accepted Schmidt's mandarin outlook this anthology turns out to be altogether sensible, reliable and even cherishable. For a start, there's just about all the most famous poets and poems de nos jours. From Eliot and Hardy, through Hughes and Plath, to present-day faves Glyn Maxwell, Simon Armitage and Sophie Hannah, Schmidt rarely misses a beat. Indeed, he even sees fit to include honestly popular gems like Robert Frost's "Birches", or Wilfred Owen's "Dulce et Decorum Est" and Wendy Cope's wonderfully humourous "Waste Land Limerick". All in all, a finely judged collection. --Sean Thomas
