Reading America: Essays on American LiteratureKnopf, 1987 - 320 pages The distinguished critic offers us his selection of his essays and commentaries on American writing and writers, from Emerson and Whitman through Auden and Ashbery. Donoghue examines the canon in the light of the American enterprise -- the imperatives of a powerful national past versus the subversions of an irrevocably anarchic spirit. The result is indispensable readinig for anyone hoping to inquire humanely into our national literature. -- Publisher's description. |
Contents
America in Theory | 3 |
Emerson at First | 20 |
Thoreau | 40 |
Whitman | 68 |
Emily Dickinson | 97 |
Henry Adamss Novels III | 111 |
Henry James and The Sense of the Past | 127 |
On Gerontion | 144 |
Trilling Mind and Society | 175 |
Conrad Aiken | 199 |
Marianne Moore | 206 |
Wallace Stevens | 218 |
H D | 237 |
Auden | 254 |
John Berryman | 276 |
Sylvia Plath | 296 |
Stevenss Gibberish | 158 |