1. Modern, Post-Modern, & Contemporary Poetry

2. Modern Poetry (1900-1950) Follows basic characteristics of Modernism
Rejection of traditional form and content
Generally speaking, Modern poetry offers
Social critique
Introspection
Experimental form
Untraditional sources for inspiration
Free verse

3. Edwin Arlington Robinson
Content was bold and experimental
Characters who experience personal defeats and have generally a pessimistic outlook on life
Known for his wise and ironic views of human behavior (this is what makes him fit the modern period)
Strove for realism in his poetry
Narrative Poetry
Poetry that tells a story and has elements of plot, setting, and character
Speaker: the voice that tells the story

4. Edgar Lee Masters
Product of the Midwest—found small town life oppressive
Became a lawyer in Chicago and began writing poems, plays, and essays
In 1914, a friend gave him a copy of Select Epigrams from the Greek Anthology
Collection of epigraphs—a short poem, usually engraved on a gravestone, which sums up an individual’s life

5. Edgar Lee Masters
Decided to write a book of epigraphs that would reveal the dark underside of small town life
Gossip/Rumors --Affairs --Abortions
Addictions --Rape --Murder
Published Spoon River Anthology in 1915
Created fictional town of Spoon River, IL
Rejected traditional forms—all poems are in free verse
Over 250 epigraphs create the town through the dead
Epigraphs are written in the voice of the dead, and an entire life is usually revealed through one incident that is remembered even in death

6. Dramatic Monologue/Epitaphs
Audience is implied
No dialogue
Poet speaks through the voice of a fictional character (persona)

7. Robert Frost—tradition in a Modernist world
Characteristics of Frost’s Poetry
Popular with critics and public
Devoted to traditional forms
Used conversational language
Focused on American landscapes, specifically New England
Known for “cranky realism”
Influenced heavily by Emerson and “Self Reliance”

8. Robert Frost “Birches” and “Mending Wall” Style: Blank Verse
Unrhymed iambic pentameter
Sounds like conversational English
Relies on other sound effects than rhyme to create poetic elements
Alliteration
Onomatopoeia
Auditory imagery
Assonance
Consonance
Parallelism/anaphora
Poem categorized as a pastoral: a poem that deals with a rural setting

9. The Harlem Renaissance
Period when African American Artists were taken seriously for the first time
First chance for group expression of African American values
No shared style among all artists
Instead, shared the desire to document the experiences of African Americans through multiple styles

10. The Harlem Renaissance
Roots of the movement
Began with Great Migrationearly 1900s
Hundreds of thousands of African Americans moved from rural South to industrialized cities in the North for job opportunities
Brought African Americans together into smaller communities, like Harlem
Becomes a meeting ground for writers, artists, and musicians
Depended on one another for inspiration and support
The change in living conditions and community stimulated creativity

11. The Harlem Renaissance
Writers celebrated racial identity
Over 50 volumes of poetry and fiction produced
Did not just affect literatureAfrican American artists also influenced visual arts, and led to the creation of Jazz Music
Legacy of HR
Opened doors of acceptance to African American Artists
Gave Americans a language to begin a discussion of racism
Broke ground for next generation of African American artists—Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou, Alice Walker, Ralph Ellison

12. Langston Hughes ( )
The most successful writer of the HR and the African American experience
After graduating from HS, published “The Negro Speaks of Rivers”
Moved to NYC and attended Columbia University first introduction to Harlem
Quit school after first year worked/traveled to Africa and Europe
After returning from Europe, moved to DC
Discovered by poet Vachel Lindsay in 1925
Published first collection of poetry The Weary Blues in 1926
Earned a scholarship to continue education

13. Langston Hughes Impact and Legacy
Helped define the spirit of HR: “express our individual dark-skinned selves without fear or shame”
Intentionally echoed rhythms of Jazz and Blues in his poetry
Traditional Blues song 12 bars of music, in 4/4 time, using three simple chords
Hughes used this structure in at least half his poems
Forced readers to look at poetry with a
social perspective: how the lit reflects issues in society at time when it is written
Archetypal perspective: how the lit expresses archetypes—characters, symbols, or patterns that cross cultures
Biographical perspective: how lit is an expression of events and issues in the writer’s personal life

14. Countee Cullen
Used traditional forms and structure for poetry (rhyme and meter)
Stanza structure
Two lines: couplet
Four lines: quatrain
Six lines: sestet
Eight lines: octave

15. Claude McKay Sonnets Shakespearean: divided into two stanzas
Opening with an octave (8 lines)
Rhyme scheme: ABBAABBA
Followed by a sestet (6 lines)
Rhyme scheme: CDECDE
Petrarchan: divided into 4 stanzas
First three stanzas are quatrains (4 lines)
Rhyme Scheme: ABAB CDCD EFEF
Final stanza is a rhyming couplet (2 lines)
Rhyme scheme: GG

16. Claude McKay Born in Jamaica, considered Harlem his spiritual home
Emigrated to US after publishing his first collection of poems, Songs of Jamaica
Poetry focused on the social injustices experienced by African Americans
Form and structure: sonnet—14 lines, iambic pentameter
Two types
Shakespearean
Petrarchan

17. Imagism Reject the Romantics’ focus on nature as a source of solace
Movement begins in France in 1875…American writers are first introduced to French Symbolist poets during expatriate movement after WWI
Symbolism: a form of expression in which the world of appearances is violently rearranged in order to depict a different and more truthful version of reality
This violent rearrangement was visually apparent in the work of Picasso; e.e. cummings attempts to do in poetry what Picasso was doing in painting

18. Imagism Started by Ezra Pound and TS Eliot
Also heavily influenced by Japanese haiku
Imagism: believed poetry could be made purer by concentrating on the precise, clear, unqualified image
imagery alone can carry a poem’s message
Sought to rid poetry of its prettiness, sentimentality, and artificiality
Famous imagists: Pound, William Carlos Williams, Marianne Moore, Wallace Stevens, Archibald MacLeish

19. William Carlos Williams
Imagist—known for short, lyric poems which focused on a single image
Precise wording
Detailed imagery
Poems were short because Williams was a doctor—wrote many poems on prescription pads.

20. The Red Wheelbarrow
so much depends upon a red wheel barrow glazed with rainwater beside the white chickens.

21. “This is Just to Say”
I have eaten the plums that were in the icebox and which you were probably saving for breakfast Forgive me they were delicious so sweet and so cold

22. The Great Figure
Among the rain and lights I saw the figure 5 in gold on a red firetruck moving tense unheeded to gong clangs siren howls and wheels rumbling through the dark city.

23. Futurism and Concrete Poetry
Poetry that considers not just the meaning of the words, but the meaning conveyed through typography (how the poem looks in print)
Created poems that were both textual and visual
Poems take specific shapes that can only be seen in print

24. e.e. cummings
Challenged the conventions of syntax (the rules for the formation of sentences)
Made typography (the general character or appearance of printed matter) and the division of words part of the shape and meaning of the poem
Heavily influenced by French symbolism and Whitman’s free verse

25. e. e. cummings Characteristics of cummings poetry
Jubilant lyricism: happy, musical, poems
Celebration of love
Beauty of nature
Affirmation of the individual

26. “in Just-” cummings never titled his poems…sorta like Emily Dickinson 
when the world is puddle-wonderful
the queer
old balloonman whistles
far and wee
and bettyandisabel come dancing
from hop-scotch and jump-rope and
it’s
spring
and
the
goat-footed
balloonMan whistles
far
wee
in Just-
spring when the world is mud-
luscious the little
lame balloonman
whistles far and wee
and eddieandbill come
running from marbles and
piracies and it’s
spring

27. “the hills” the hills so like poets put on duneyed master
purple thought against
the
magnificent clamor of
day
tortured
in gold, which presently
crumpled
collapses
exhaling a red soul into the dark so
duneyed master
enter
the sweet gates
of my heart and
take
the
rose
which perfect is
With killing hands

28. the sky
was can dy
lu mi
nous ed I
ble
spry pinks
shy lem
ons
greens
cool
choco lates
un der
a lo co
mo tive s pout
ing vi
o lets

29. l(a le af fa ll s)
one l
iness

30. r-p-o-p-h-e-s-s-a-g-r who a(s w(e loo)k upnowgath PPEGORHRASS
eringint(o-
aThe):l eA
!p:
S a (r
rIvInG .gRrEaPsPhOs) to
rea(be)rran(com)gi(e)ngly
,grasshopper;

31. Metapoetry Metapoetry: poetry about poetry Wallace Stevens
These poems present an artistic philosophy regarding the writing and reading of poetry
As you read, analyze the philosophical arguments that support the poet’s message
Wallace Stevens
Believed the goal of poetry is to capture the interaction between the private world of the mind and reality
Uses elaborate imagery and precise language
Archibald MacLeish
Modernist who used poetry to explore social and political issues
Known for lyric poetry and verse plays
Marianne Moore
Modernist who was known for inventive, precise, and witty poems
Most common subjects of her poems are animals and nature
Animal imagery is one of the hallmarks of her work
Known for objectivist poetry—poems that focus on a single subject and render it objectively and in detail

32. Post Modern Poetry
Reaction against the ordered, rational view of the world
Reaction against stifling conformity of post WWII America
Emphasized the absurd

33. Protest Poetry Expose truths Raise consciousness Build united fronts
Poetry that calls out and talks back to inhumane forces in the world
Expose truths
Raise consciousness
Build united fronts
All warn against complacency—don’t just sit back and watch injustice occurDO SOMETHING
Woody Guthrie
Folk singer of the 1930s and 1940s
Most famous song—This Land is Your Land
Inspired by too much radio play for “God Bless America”thought the lyrics were unrealistic and complacent
Music focused on Dust Bowl Era and Depression
Music protested class inequality and unjust treatment of migrant workers
Allen Ginsberg
Leading figure in the Beat Generation of the 50s and the counterculture revolution of the 60s
Opposed militarism, economic materialism, and sexual repression
Best known for the poem “Howl” which denounced the destructive forces of capitalism and conformity of 1950s America
Bob Dylan
American songwriter and poet; won Pulitzer Prize in 2008 Nobel Prize for Literature in 2016
Influenced by Woody Guthrie
Music addressed issues of civil rights, breakdown of farming and mining communities, and the 60s counterculture movement

34. This Land is Your Land
This land is your land This land is my land From California to the New York island;  From the red wood forest to the Gulf Stream waters  This land was made for you and Me.
As I was walking that ribbon of highway,  I saw above me that endless skyway:  I saw below me that golden valley:  This land was made for you and me.
I've roamed and rambled and I followed my footsteps  To the sparkling sands of her diamond deserts;  And all around me a voice was sounding:  This land was made for you and me.
When the sun came shining, and I was strolling,  And the wheat fields waving and the dust clouds rolling,  As the fog was lifting a voice was chanting:  This land was made for you and me.
As I went walking I saw a sign there  And on the sign it said "No Trespassing."  But on the other side it didn't say nothing,  That side was made for you and me.
In the shadow of the steeple I saw my people,  By the relief office I seen my people;  As they stood there hungry, I stood there asking  Is this land made for you and me?
Nobody living can ever stop me,  As I go walking that freedom highway;  Nobody living can ever make me turn back  This land was made for you and me.

35. “Homework” by Allen Ginsberg
If I were doing my Laundry I’d wash my dirty Iran I’d throw in my United States, and pour on the Ivory Soap, scrub up Africa, put all the birds and elephants back in the jungle, I’d wash the Amazon river and clean the oily Carib & Gulf of Mexico, Rub that smog off the North Pole, wipe up all the pipelines in Alaska, Rub a dub dub for Rocky Flats and Los Alamos, Flush that sparkly Cesium out of Love Canal Rinse down the Acid Rain over the Parthenon & Sphinx, Drain Sludge out of the Mediterranean basin & make it azure again, Put some blueing back into the sky over the Rhine, bleach the little Clouds so snow return white as snow, Cleanse the Hudson Thames & Neckar, Drain the Suds out of Lake Erie Then I’d throw big Asia in one giant Load & wash out the blood & Agent Orange, Dump the whole mess of Russia and China in the wringer, squeeze out the tattletail Gray of U.S. Central American police state, & put the planet in the drier & let it sit 20 minutes or an Aeon till it came out clean.

36. “Blowin’ in the Wind” by Bob Dylan
How many roads must a man walk down Before you call him a man? Yes, ’n’ how many seas must a white dove sail Before she sleeps in the sand? Yes, ’n’ how many times must the cannonballs fly Before they’re forever banned? The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind The answer is blowin’ in the wind How many years can a mountain exist Before it’s washed to the sea? Yes, ’n’ how many years can some people exist Before they’re allowed to be free? Yes, ’n’ how many times can a man turn his head Pretending he just doesn’t see? The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind The answer is blowin’ in the wind How many times must a man look up Before he can see the sky? Yes, ’n’ how many ears must one man have Before he can hear people cry? Yes, ’n’ how many deaths will it take till he knows That too many people have died? The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind The answer is blowin’ in the wind

37. Confessional Poetry Personal to individual poet’s life and experiences
Subjects previously not discussed openly
Private experiences with feelings about
DEATH
TRAUMA
DEPRESSION
RELATIONSHIPS
Poetry explored the psychological aspects of these types of events on the psyche
CONFESSIONAL POETS: SYLVIA PLATH, ANNE SEXTON, ELIZABETH BISHOP

38. “Mirror” by Sylvia Plath
Used poetry to express intense feelings of despair and deep inner pan
Struggled with severe depression most of her life
Ended her own life at the age of 31
Personifies the mirror
In what ways does the mirror describe itself?
Silver, exact
Not cruel, only truthful
The eye of a little god
What does the mirror spend most of its time doing?
Mediating on the opposite wall
When the woman appears in the second stanza, how does she react to the mirror? Why?

39. Anne Sexton Like Plath, Sexton also struggles with severe depression
Came on after the birth of her two daughters
Pursued poetry at the suggestion of her doctors as a way to work through her depression
Poems gave readers an intimate and uncomfortable look at her troubled mind
Poems expressed frustrations of trying to lead a creative life while constrained by society’s expectations for women at the time (1960s)
Also ended her own life at 46

40. Billy Collins Born in 1941 in NYC Poetry is known for
Published his first collection of poetry in 1977
Poetry is known for
Conversational tone
Witty humor
Quirky, tender, or profound observations on the everyday

41. Yusef Komunyakaa Born in Lousiana in 1947 Poetry is known for…
Joined Army in 1965served in Vietnam, reporting from the front lines of the conflict
Published his first collection of poetry in 1977
Poetry is known for…
Subject matter: the Vietnam War
Breakthrough publication was in 1988 with collection of war poems Dien Cai Du (Vietnamese for “This Crazy Head”

42. Stanley Kunitz Born in Massachusetts in 1905
Life was shadowed by the death of his father, who committed suicide shortly before he was born
Worked first as a newspaper journalist, published his first book of poetry in 1930
Abstract in theme, formal in style
As Kunitz aged, his poetry changed
Later poetry has a clear, spare style
Shorter lines
Subject becomes more human
Early poems have a dark and grieving tone; later poems are clear and luminous or mix elements of the light and the dark