The Wild Card

by Shapiro, Karl Jay; Kunitz, Stanley; Ignatow, David; Ignatow, David

• ISBN13: 9780252066894
• ISBN10: 0252066898
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1998-06-01
• Publisher: Univ of Illinois Pr

Summary

Karl Shapiro, who won the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry in 1945 for his second collection, V-Letter and Other Poems, is an American poetic treasure and an acknowledged master of lyrical poetry whose subjects have ranged from commonplace objects and occurrences to biting political commentary to open celebrations of the contradictions in humanity's moral nature.

Author Biography

Karl Shapiro, one of the twentieth century's major poets, has published more than twenty books, including poetry, essays, and fiction. He has been Consultant in Poetry at the Library of Congress, the position now known as U.S. Poet Laureate, and a winner in 1969 of the Bollingen Prize. Shapiro is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Formerly a faculty member of several major universities, he is now retired and lives in Manhattan. Stanley Kunitz and the late David Ignatow are two of the most celebrated poets of the latter part of the century. The late M. L. Rosenthal was a distinguished poet and critic who for many years was poetry editor of The Nation.

Table of Contents

Foreword	p. xv
Introduction	p. xix
From Person, Place, and Thing (1942)
The Dome of Sunday	p. 3
Washington Cathedral	p. 5
Auto Wreck	p. 7
Hospital	p. 9
The Fly	p. 11
University	p. 13
Drug Store	p. 15
Haircut	p. 16
Waitress	p. 17
Buick	p. 18
Israfel	p. 19
Mongolian Idiot	p. 20
Necropolis	p. 21
October I	p. 22
Epitaph for John and Richard	p. 24
Emporium	p. 25
Death of Emma Goldman	p. 26
The Contraband	p. 27
Elegy for Two Banjos	p. 28
Scyros	p. 30
The Glutton	p. 32
Poet	p. 33
Travelogue for Exiles	p. 36
Midnight Show	p. 37
Conscription Camp	p. 39
The Twins	p. 42
Nostalgia	p. 43
A Cut Flower	p. 44
From V-Letter and Other Poems (1944)
Troop Train	p. 47
Christmas Eve: Australia	p. 49
Piano	p. 50
Magician	p. 51
Red Indian	p. 53
Full Moon: New Guinea	p. 54
The Gun	p. 55
The Second-Best Bed	p. 56
Fireworks	p. 58
Lord, I Have Seen Too Much	p. 59
Franklin	p. 60
Jefferson	p. 61
Sunday: New Guinea	p. 62
Jew	p. 63
Shylock	p. 64
The Synagogue	p. 65
The Interlude	p. 67
The Intellectual	p. 69
V-Letter	p. 71
Elegy for a Dead Soldier	p. 73
From Trial of a Poet (1947)
Homecoming	p. 81
The Conscientious Objector	p. 83
The Progress of Faust	p. 84
In the Waxworks	p. 86
D.C.	p. 88
The Convert	p. 90
Boy-Man	p. 92
The Southerner	p. 94
Recapitulations	p. 96
From Poems 1940-1953 (1953)
Israel	p. 103
The Minute	p. 104
The Figurehead	p. 106
The Potomac	p. 108
Going to School	p. 109
From Poems of a Jew (1958)
The Alphabet	p. 115
Messias	p. 116
The Confirmation	p. 117
The First Time	p. 119
The Murder of Moses	p. 120
From The Bourgeois Poet (1964)
Solipsism	p. 125
The Bourgeois Poet	p. 126
The Living Rooms of My Neighbors	p. 127
The Wood	p. 128
The Clearing	p. 129
Hair	p. 130
Beautiful Thing	p. 131
Office Love	p. 132
High School	p. 133
The Child Who Is Silent	p. 134
Generations	p. 135
I Am an Atheist Who Says His Prayers	p. 136
My Century	p. 138
Amsterdam Whores	p. 139
Jazz	p. 140
Nebraska	p. 141
The Cracking-Plant	p. 142
Burlesk	p. 143
Bouquet	p. 144
Fox Hole	p. 145
The Nature of Belief	p. 146
French Poetry	p. 147
Baudelaire in Iowa	p. 148
Randall Jarrell	p. 149
Clowning	p. 150
Roethke	p. 151
Poets' Corner	p. 152
Glad Hand	p. 153
Fame	p. 154
The Funeral of Poetry	p. 155
From Selected Poems (1968)
Manhole Covers	p. 159
Calling the Child	p. 160
Lines for a Unitarian Church	p. 161
Bad Taste, Inc.	p. 162
Human Nature	p. 163
You Call These Poems?	p. 164
Emily Dickinson and Katherine Anne Porter	p. 165
California Winter	p. 166
A Selection of Poems (1969-92)
There Was That Roman Poet	p. 171
W.H.A.	p. 172
The Old Poet	p. 173
Mozart's Jew	p. 174
The Humanities Building	p. 175
Crossing Lincoln Park	p. 177
My Father's Funeral	p. 178
Moving In	p. 180
A Curiosity	p. 182
The Piano Tuner's Wife	p. 183
At Auden's Grave	p. 184
The Old Horsefly	p. 187
Tennyson	p. 188
Whitman	p. 189
Future-Perfect	p. 190
July 7, 1978	p. 191
Acknowledgments	p. 193
Table of Contents provided by Syndetics. All Rights Reserved.