Literary Interpretation: Beyond the Limits of the Lyric

Readings

Books

Ellman, Richard, ed. Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988. ISBN: 0393956369.

Lowell, Robert. Life Studies. New York, NY: Noonday Press, 1972. ISBN: 0374506280.

Bishop, Elizabeth. Geography III. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1976. ISBN: 0374514402.

Plath, Sylvia. Ariel. New York, NY: Harper Collins, 1999. ISBN: 0060931728.

Doolittle, Hilda (HD). Trilogy. New York, NY: New Directions, 1998. ISBN: 0811213994.

Neruda, Pablo. The Heights of Macchu Picchu. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1966. ISBN: 0374506485.

Milosz, Czeslaw. New and Collected Poems. New York, NY: Ecco, 2003. ISBN: 0060514485.

Also texts by Anna Akhmatova, Wislawa Szymborska and other poets.

Readings by Session

WEEK #	Topics	Required readings	ANCILLARY readings
1	Introductions
2	Akhmatova Poems; Discussion and Biography Film: Aranovich, Semyon. The Anna Achmatova File. 1989	Akhmatova, Anna. “As White a Stone,” “Cleopatra,” “Courage,” “The Grey-Eyed King,” “I Don’t Like Flowers,” “Lot’s Wife,” “Muse,” “Music,” “Requiem,” “Three Things,” “The Last Toast,” “To Boris,” “Pasternak,” “Why is this Century Worse,” and “You’ll Live, but I’ll not….”
3	Walt Whitman; T. S. Eliot; William Carlos Williams; Ezra Pound; Hilda Doolittle	Whitman, Walt. “Crossing Brooklyn Ferry” and “To a Locomotive in Winter.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.  Eliot, T. S. “Hamlet and His Problems.” In The Sacred Wood. London, UK: Methune, 1920. -–. “Gerontion.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.  Williams, William Carlos. “Spring and All,” “Widow’s Lament in Springtime,” “The Red Wheelbarrow,” “At the Ball Game,” “This is Just to Say,” “The Yachts,” and “The Dance.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.  Pound, Ezra. “Portrait d’une Femme,” “The Return,” “The River Merchant’s Wife,” “A Pact,” “Hugh Selwyn Mauberley,” and “Mauberley.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.  HD. “Sea Rose,” “Garden,” “Oread,” and “Helen.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.
4	Wilfred Owen; W. B. Yeats; Siegfried Sassoon; W. H. Auden; Randall Jarrell	Owen, Wilfred. “Anthem for Doomed Youth,” “Dulce et Decorum Est,” “Strange Meeting,” “Futility,” “Greater Love,” “Mental Cases,” “Disabled,” and “Exposure.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.  Yeats, W. B. “Adam’s Curse,” “No Second Troy,” “Easter, 1916,” and “An Irish Airman Foresees His Death.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.  Sassoon, Siegfried. “To His Dead Body,” “‘Blighters’,” “Everyone Sang,” and “Repression of War Experience.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.  Auden, W. H. “Musee des Beaux Arts,” “In Memory of W. B. Yeats,” “September 1, 1939,” and “Lullaby.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.  Jarrell, Randall. “90 North,” “Death of the Ball Turret Gunner,” and “Eighth Air Force.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.
5	Robert Lowell, Life Studies	Lowell, Robert. “91 Revere Street,” “Memories of West Street and Lepke,” and “Skunk Hour.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.	Berryman, John. Dream Songs. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1982, pp. 14, 15, 75-76, 194, 312. ISBN: 0374516707. Jarrell, Randall. “Girl in a Library,” and “Next Day.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.  Snodgrass, W. D. “Heart’s Needle.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.  Ginsberg, Allen. “Howl,” and “A Supermarket in California.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.
6	Robert Lowell, Life Studies (cont.)	Lowell, Robert. Life Studies New York, NY: Noonday Press, 1972. [especially “Grandparents” and “Last Days.” Begin Plath, Sylvia.  Ariel. New York, NY: Harper Collins, 1999. [Opening poems, “Daddy.”]
7	Sylvia Plath, Ariel	Plath, Sylvia. Ariel. New York, NY: Harper Collins, 1999. Especially: “Bee” poems, “Rabbit Catcher.”	Hughes, Ted. “Thought Fox,” and “Rabbit Catcher.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.  Sexton, Anne. “The Truth the Dead Know,” “Starry Night,” “All My Pretty Ones,” and “Wanting to Die.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.
8	Pablo Neruda, The Heights of Macchu Picchu	Neruda, Pablo. The Heights of Macchu Picchu.	Whitman, Walt. “Crossing Brooklyn Ferry.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.
9	Hilda Doolittle, Trilogy	Doolittle, Hilda. Trilogy. New York, NY: New Directions, 1998. Especially: Book I and final scenes of Book III (“Magi”).
10	Elizabeth Bishop, Geography III	Bishop, Elizabeth. Geography III.	Larkin, Philip. “Toads,” “Church Going,” “Forget What Did,” and “High Windows.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.
11	Czeslaw Milosz, New and Collected Poems: First Third (Poems in Poland in Early Exile in France)	Especially: “Campo De Fiori,” “The World,” “Voices of Poor People,” “Dedication,” “Song of Porcelain,” “Child of Europe,” and “Mittlebergheim.” In New and Collected Poems. New York, NY: Ecco, 2003.
12	Czeslaw Milosz, New and Collected Poems : Second Third (Poems in Exile in France and Early in America)	Especially: “King Popiel,” “Magpiety,” “Throughout Our Lands,” “With Trumpets and Zithers,” and “Ars Poetica?” In New and Collected Poems. New York, NY: Ecco, 2003.	Jeffers, Robinson. “Shine, Perishing Republic,” “Hurt Hawk,” “Rock and Hawk,” “Ave Caesar,” and “Carmel Point.” In Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1988.
13	Czeslaw Milosz, New and Collected Poems: Final Third (Poems in America/Old Age)	Especially: “Higher Arguments in Favor of Discipline….,” “I Sleep a Lot,” “Poetic State,” “Ferom the Rising of the Sun,” and “Rading the Japanese Poet Issa.” In New and Collected Poems. New York, NY: Ecco, 2003.	Szymborska, Wislawa. Poems from “The End and the Beginning.” In Poems New and Collected. New York, NY: Harcourt, 1999 [Especially “Heaven”.]