Reputations of the Tongue
Essays on Poets
and Poetry
by
William Logan
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this Book now
William Logan has been
called the most dangerous poetry critic since Randall
Jarrell. A critic of intensity and savage wit, he is the
most irritating and strong-minded reviewer of
contemporary poetry we have. A survey of American,
British, and Irish poetry in the eighties and early
nineties, Reputations of the Tongue is a book of
poetry criticism more honest than any since
Jarrell’s Poetry and the Age.
The book opens with an essay arguing with Eliot over
tradition and individual talent; it closes with a close
scrutiny of contemporary British and Irish poetry. At the
heart of the book are long essays on W. H. Auden, W. D.
Snodgrass, Donald Justice, and Geoffrey Hill--and the
reviews of major and minor contemporary poets that have
earned Logan his reputation.
Appearing in publications like the New York Times,
Washington Post, Poetry, Parnassus, and Sewanee
Review, Logan’s reviews have been noted for
their violence, intelligence, candor, and humor. Many
aroused tempers on first publication, leading one
Pulitzer Prize winner to offer to run the critic over
with a truck. Even as he tackles the radical excess of
Ashbery and Ginsberg, however, Logan lauds the rich
quietudes of Elizabeth Bishop and James Merrill, the
froth and verbal fervor of Amy Clampitt, the
philosophical comedies of Gjertrud Schnackenberg. The
essays in this collection take the long view. Aspiring to
more than miscellany or gossip, Reputations of the
Tongue is the work of a critic for whom the
reviewing of poetry is still a high calling.
William Logan
is the
author of four books of poems, Sad-faced Men
(1982), Difficulty (1985), Sullen Weedy
Lakes (1988), and Vain Empires (1998), and
a book of criticism, All the Rage (1998). He has
won the Peter I. B. Lavan Younger Poets Award from the
Academy of American Poets and the Citation for Excellence
in Reviewing from the National Book Critics Circle. He
teaches at the University of Florida, where he is
Alumni/ae Professor of English. He lives in Gainesville,
Florida, and Cambridge, England.
1999. 258pp. 6 X 9.
ISBN 0-8130-1697-5 Cloth, $34.95
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"I
have heard writers refer to [William Logan] as ‘the
most hated man in American poetry,’ a title one
could be proud of in this time of fawning and
favor-trading."--Robert McDowell, Hudson
Review
"Is there today a more stringent, caring reader of
American poetry than William Logan? Reputations of
the Tongue may, at moments, read harshly. But this
edge is one of deeply considered and concerned authority.
A poet-critic engages closely with his masters, with his
peers, with those whom he regards as falling short. This
collection is an adventure of sensibility."—George
Steiner
Titles of
Related Interest:
Everything Paid For,
Robley Wilson
Impure,
Tony Barnstone
Italo Calvino,
Constance
Markey
The
University of Central Florida
Contemporary Poetry Series
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