Paterson (The Penguin poets) - Softcover

Williams, William Carlos

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0140423168 ISBN 13: 9780140423167

Publisher: Penguin, 1983

Synopsis

Paterson is both a place the New Jersey city in whom the person (the poet's own life) and the public (the history of the region) are combined. Originally four books (published individually between 1946 and 1951), the structure of Paterson (in Dr. Williams' words) "follows the course of teh Passaic River" from above the great falls to its entrance into the sea. The unexpected Book Five, published in 1958, affirms the triumphant life of the imagination, in spite of age and death. This revised edition has been meticulously re-edited by Christopher MacGowan, who has supplied a wealth of notes and explanatory material."

About this title

About the Author:

William Carlos Williams was born in Rutherford, New Jersey, in 1883. He lived there most of his life, practising medicine as a paediatrician. While studying at the Pennsylvania Medical School he became a friend of Ezra Pound and H. Doolittle, and was deeply influenced by Imagism. The limitations of Imagism, however, soon led him to launch his own campaign to 'create somehow by intense, individual effort, a new - and American - poetic language.'

From the Back Cover:

'Paterson is Whitman's America, grown pathetic and tragic, brutalized by inequality, disorganized by industrial chaos, and faced with annihilation. No poet has written of it with such a combination of brilliance, sympathy, and experience, with such alertness and energy.' - Robert Lowell

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin
• Publication date: 1983
• ISBN 10: 0140423168
• ISBN 13: 9780140423167
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 256