Collected Prose

by Olson, Charles; Allen, Donald; Friedlander, Benjamin; Creeley, Robert; Creeley, Robert

• ISBN13: 9780520208735
• ISBN10: 0520208730
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1997-11-01
• Publisher: Univ of California Pr

Summary

The prose writings of Charles Olson (1910-1970) have had a far-reaching and continuing impact on post-World War II American poetics. Olson's theories, which made explicit the principles of his own poetics and those of the Black Mountain poets, were instrumental in defining the sense of the postmodern in poetry and form the basis of most postwar free verse. TheCollected Prosebrings together in one volume the works published for the most part between 1946 and 1969, many of which are now out of print. A valuable companion to editions of Olson's poetry, the book backgrounds the poetics, preoccupations, and fascinations that underpin his great poems. Included areCall Me Ishmael, a classic of American literary criticism; the influential essays "Projective Verse" and "Human Universe"; and essays, book reviews, and Olson's notes on his studies. In these pieces one can trace the development of his new science of man, called "muthologos," a radical mix of myth and phenomenology that Olson offered in opposition to the mechanistic discourse and rationalizing policy he associated with America's recent wars in Europe and Asia. Editors Donald Allen and Benjamin Friedlander offer helpful annotations throughout, and poet Robert Creeley, who enjoyed a long and mutually influential relationship with Olson, provides the book's introduction.

Table of Contents

Editors' Preface
Introduction
Call Me Ishmael	p. 1
On Melville, Dostoevsky, Lawrence, and Pound	p. 107
David Young, David Old	p. 109
The Materials and Weights of Herman Melville	p. 113
Equal, That Is, to the Real Itself	p. 120
Dostoevsky and The Possessed	p. 126
D. H. Lawrence and the High Temptation of the Mind	p. 135
The Escaped Cock	p. 138
This Is Yeats Speaking	p. 141
GrandPa, GoodBye	p. 145
Human Universe	p. 153
Human Universe	p. 155
Footnote to HU (lost in the shuffle)	p. 167
The Gate and the Center	p. 168
The Resistance	p. 174
Cy Twombly	p. 175
Proprioception	p. 179
Place; and Names	p. 200
"you can't use words ..."	p. 202
The Present Is Prologue	p. 203
"The Present Is Prologue"	p. 205
Stocking Cap	p. 208
Mr. Meyer	p. 213
The Post Office	p. 217
Poetry and Poets	p. 237
Projective Verse	p. 239
Letter to Elaine Feinstein	p. 250
"On Poets and Poetry"	p. 253
Notes on Language and Theater	p. 256
Against Wisdom as Such	p. 260
Theocritus	p. 265
A Foot Is to Kick With	p. 269
Quantity in Verse, and Shakespeare's Late Plays	p. 270
Introduction to Robert Creeley	p. 283
Robert Creeley's For Love: Poems 1950-1960	p. 285
Paterson, Book V	p. 288
"Ed Sanders' Language"	p. 291
Space and Time	p. 293
Introduction to The Sutter-Marshall Lease	p. 295
A Bibliography on America for Ed Dorn	p. 297
Billy the Kid	p. 311
Brooks Adams' The New Empire	p. 315
Captain John Smith	p. 318
Five Foot Four, but Smith Was a Giant	p. 322
The Contours of American History	p. 324
The Vinland Map Review	p. 326
Other Essays, Notes, and Reviews	p. 337
Ernst Robert Curtius	p. 339
It Was, But It Ain't	p. 342
Homer and Bible	p. 345
Bill Snow	p. 349
A House Built by Capt. John Somes 1763	p. 351
The Advantage of Literacy Is That Words Can Be on the Page	p. 353
Review of Eric A. Havelock's Preface to Plato	p. 355
A Further Note on the Critical Advantages of Eric Havelock's Preface to Plato	p. 359
Statement for the Cambridge magazine	p. 360
A comprehension (a measure, that	p. 361
"Clear Shining Water," De Vries says	p. 364
What's Back There	p. 367
The Animate versus the Mechanical, and Thought	p. 368
Continuing Attempt to Pull the Taffy off the Roof of the Mouth	p. 373
Abbreviations	p. 375
A Note on Olson's Sources	p. 377
Editors' Notes	p. 379
Index	p. 465
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