Body My House : May Swenson's Work and Life / / edited by Paul Crumbley and Patricia M. Gantt.

• Author: Gantt, Patricia M.
• TeilnehmendeR: Gantt, Patricia M., 1943-; Crumbley, Paul, 1952-
• Place / Publishing House: Logan, Utah : : Utah State University Press,, 2006.; ©2006.
• Year of Publication: 2006
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (254 pages) :; illustrations; digital, PDF file(s).
• Notes: Description based upon print version of record.

The first collection of critical essays on May Swenson and her literary universe, Body My House initiates an academic conversation about an unquestionably major poet of the middle and late twentieth century. Includes many previously unpublished Swenson poems. Essays here address the breadth of Swenson's literary corpus and offer varied scholarly approaches to it. They reference Swenson manuscripts---poems, letters, diaries, and other prose---some of which have not been widely available before. Chapters focus on Swenson's work as a nature writer; the literary and social contexts of her writing; her national and international acclaim; her work as a translator; associations with other poets and writers (Bishop, Moore, and others); her creative process; and her profound explorations of gender and sexuality. The first full volume of scholarship on May Swenson, Body My House suggests an ambitious agenda for further work. Between the 1950s and the 1980s, May Swenson produced eleven volumes of poetry, received many major awards, was elected chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, and was acclaimed by writers in virtually every school of American poetry.

Table of Contents

Introduction / Patricia M. Gantt -- May Swenson chronology / Paul Crumbley and Patricia M. Gantt -- The love poems and letters of May Swenson / R. R. Knudson -- A figure in the tapestry : the poet's feeling runs ahead of her imagination / Paul Swenson -- May Swenson : Whitman's daughter / Alicia Ostriker -- May Swenson and Elizabeth Bishop / Kirstin Hotelling Zona -- De-Cartesianizing the universe : May Swenson's design of wor(l)ds / Gudrun M. Grabher -- That never told CAN be : May Swenson's manuscript witnesses / Martha Nell Smith -- Material girl : May Swenson's logopoetic materialism / Cynthia Hogue -- May Swenson and other animals : her poetics of natural selection / Paul Crumbley -- How everything happens : notes on May Swenson's theory of writing / Michael Spooner -- The queer poetics of May Swenson / Suzanne Juhasz -- "Question" and more questions : two shells for May Swenson / Mark Doty -- Bibliography of the works of May Swenson / compiled by Alice Geffen ; introduced by Carole Berglie.