| Modern Poems: An Introduction to Poetrtj has come into being because of what we have learned as teachers of American college students and as editors of The Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. Students, when they can choose, often prefer to phmge at once into the poetry of their own century. It responds, after all, to the social and historical conditions in which they find themselves, and its ways of thinking and feeling are those in which they feel most at home. And, of course, much of it is written in contemporary English, the idiom we speak today. In gathering the selec- tions for our longer survey of modern poetry, we came to see that many of these poems would be especially pertinent and moving to studen(s beginning the study of poetry in college, and that their teachers might well share our feeling that such an introduction can be particularly suitable. Because Modern Poems is an introduction, we begin the book by pre- senting, in a section called "Reading Poems," the necessary terms and definitions for the discussion of poetry. Most examples given in these pages are taken from the poems in this book. Teachers may want to use this section as general background, or they may prefer to select one of the topics here and use particular poems from the body of the anthology to illustrate it. The essay has been prepared under the supervision of our editor, John Francis; in trying to make it as useful as possible, we havesought the advice of Albert and Barbara Gelpi (Stanford UniVersity), Ronald Sharp (Kenyon College), Robert Phelps, and Scott Elledge (Cor-nell University), whose sensitive and practical suggestions we acknowl- edge with thanks. In selecting the poems themselves, our aim has been to offer a range ofwork, from the easily accessible to the more difficult, which representsthe major modes and aspects of all poetry, regardless of period. We havealso songht to represent the principal directions in modern poetry: themost prominent writers and literary groupings appear in sufficient depthso that their interconnections may be studied, and the essay "ModernPoetry in English: A Brief History" offers the setting in which thepoems can be regarded. So that students wilt be able to read the poems included here withoutconsulting reference books, each poem has been annotated, and eachauthor is hriefly introduced in biographical terms. Finally, a bibliographyis provided of all the books of poetry and the principal works of proseby each poet. A note about texts: as a rule, the version here of each poem is the lastover which the author may be presumed to have exercised editorial con-trol. Certain exceptions have been made as necessary, and occasionallylines from alternative versions are also given; these textual questions arepresented in the footnotes. The poems of each author are arranged |
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