Overview

Modern American Poetry and the Architectural Imagination: The Harmony of Forms assesses the relationship between architectural and poetic innovation in the United States across the twentieth century. Taking the work of five key poets as case studies and drawing on the work of a rich range of other writers, architects, artists, and commentators, this study proposes that by examining the sustained and productive--if hitherto overlooked--engagement between the two disciplines, we enrich our understanding of the complexity and interrelationship of both. The book begins by tracing the rise of what was conceived of as 'modern' (and often 'international style') architecture and by showing how poetry and architecture in the early decades of the century developed in dialogue, and within a shared, and often transnational, context. It then moves on to examine the material, aesthetic, and social conditions that helped shape both disciplines, offering new readings of familiar poems and bringing other pertinent resources to light. It considers the uses to which poets of the period put the insights of architecture--and vice versa. In closing, Gill turns to modern and contemporary architects' written accounts of their own practice, in memoirs and other commentaries, and examines how they have assimilated, or resisted, the practice and vision of poetry.

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9780198868347

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Reviews

The book houses a vast community of creative and academic work while focusing on close readings of poems that sparkle with new insights. * Angus Cleghorn, Seneca College * Gill's focus on the conversation between modern poetry and architecture and its attention to form and function in both disciplines make this an important foundational text for scholars, as well as advanced undergraduate and graduate students. * Bethany Hicok, Williams College, USA *

Author Information

Jo Gill is Vice-Principal and Head of the College of Arts at the University of Glasgow. She specialises in mid-century American literature and culture and has published widely on writers including Anne Sexton, Sylvia Plath, Robert Lowell, Elizabeth Bishop, and Gwendolyn Brooks.

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