From Publishers Weekly
Born in the Midwest but predominantly known as a founding poet of the San Francisco renaissance, Rexroth (1905-1982) wrote from deep within multiple traditions of world literature, Eastern and Western philosophy, and radical politics. Rexroth published many of his 54 books with New Directions, and while a good number are in print, some editions are more than 30 years old. This volume, scrupulously edited by novelist and poet Morrow (Ariel's Crossing) and poet and Copper Canyon publisher Hammill, brings much disparate and previously uncollected material together chronologically, including Rexroth's brilliant long poem "The Dragon and the Unicorn." The difficulty of assigning Rexroth a comfortable place on syllabi contributes to his current invisibility: some of Rexroth's earliest efforts in verse are cubist-influenced (some were included in Zukofsky's "Objectivist" issue of Poetry magazine), but Rexroth made a decision to make his poetry less opaque relatively early in his career, creating a technique that mixed a classical structure with a romantic sensibility. From "Between Myself and Death": "A fervor parches you sometimes,/ And you hunch over it, silent,/ Cruel, and timid; and sometimes/ You are frightened with wantonness,/ And give me your desperation./ Mostly we lurk in our coverts,/ Protecting our spleens, pretending/ That our bandages are our wounds." Though Rexroth published translations from Greek, French, Chinese, and Japanese (including Japanese women writers, extremely rare for the time), this edition is obliged to exclude them. While a tireless promoter of younger poets and neglected contemporaries, Rexroth is largely remembered as the "father of the Beat generation" (a label he repeatedly rejected as when he told Time magazine, "An entomo st is not a bug"), but he was, and remains, a great poet in his own right. Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Although his translations of classical Chinese and Japanese poetry, his promotion of the Beat poets, and his literary journalism made him famous, Rexroth (1905-82) was first a fine original poet. As coeditor Hamill notes in the introduction here, Rexroth was a neoclassicist serving the avant-garde, like Ezra Pound before him and James Laughlin, who published him and his enthusiasms at New Directions, with him. His most characteristic poetry consists of short erotic and reflective lyrics that reflect his knowledge--fundamentally self-taught--of classical Western as well as Eastern literature, of Catullus as well as Tu Fu; and of long, philosophical, politically radical (anarchist) narrative travel poems. He experimented a bit with peculiarly modernist literary manners, such as literary cubism, but settled on a seven-syllable line as his distinctive medium for original poetry. Most of the latter 500 pages of this book is in that line, and if you love looking things up and taking reading side-trips, Rexroth is one of the most readable and rewarding twentieth-century American poets. Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Book Description
Kenneth Rexroth is a poet of enormous achievement. This Complete Poems assembles all of his published longer and shorter poems, and includes a never-before-published selection of his earliest work. Rexroth's poems of nature and protest are remarkable for their erudition and biting social and political commentary; his love poems justly celebrated for their eroticism and depth of feeling. The definitive Rexroth volume.

About the Author
By any measure, Kenneth Rexroth (1905-1982) is one of the century's great literary minds. In addition to being a poet, translator, essayist and teacher, Rexroth also helped found the San Francisco Poetry Center. He was reluctantly branded "Grandfather of the Beats" and influenced generations of readers with his Classics Revisited series.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

The Complete Poems of Kenneth Rexroth assembles all of his published longer and shorter poems, and includes a never-before-published selection of his earliest work. Rexroth's poems of nature and protest are remarkable for their erudition and biting social and political commentary; his love poems justly celebrated for their eroticism and depth of feeling.

The cloth edition was one of the most widely reviewed poetry titles in 2003:

"Scholars and critics who endeavor to discuss mid-20th century American poetry responsibly ignore Rexroth at their peril."-Los Angeles Times Book Review, cover feature and selected as a Book of the Year

"Rexroth is probably best known as the 'Father of the Beat Generation.' These poems reveal that great beauty lies beyond that cliche."-NPR's All Things Considered

"Rexroth's prodigious breadth of learning, his hungry attention to the natural world, his contempt for warmongering and his profound, occasionally overlapping love of women are all on flourishing display."-The San Francisco Chronicle

"Rexroth never mistook his poetry for a product, and he could present ideas and images in an urgent, memorable and eloquent way."-The Nation

"Rexroth is one of the most readable and rewarding 20th-century American poets."-Booklist

Kenneth Rexroth (1905-1982) was one of the world's great literary minds. In addition to being a poet, translator, essayist and teacher, he helped found the San Francisco Poetry Center and influenced generations of readers with his Classics Revisited series.

SYNOPSIS

Kenneth Rexroth is a poet of enormous achievement. The Complete Poems of Kenneth Rexroth assembles all of his published longer and shorter poems, and includes a never-before-published selection of his earliest work. Rexroth's poems of nature and protest are remarkable for their erudition and biting social and political commentary; his love poems justly celebrated for their eroticism and depth of feeling. The definitive Rexroth volume.

About the Author

By any measure, Kenneth Rexroth (1905-1982) is one of the world's great literary minds. In addition to being a poet, translator, essayist and teacher, Rexroth also helped found the San Francisco Poetry Center. He was reluctantly branded "Grandfather of the Beats" and influenced generations of readers with his Classics Revisited series.

FROM THE CRITICS

The New York Times

This volume, edited by Hamill and Bradford Morrow, is a massive — and, for the most part, massively satisfying — attempt to restore its author to a central position in American literature. At more than 750 pages, it includes, in sequence, all of Rexroth's individual collections, as well as several long-out-of-print older poems and previously unavailable works. — David L. Ulin

Los Angeles Times

A poet of rare depth, range and power... one of a handful of American poets that deserve to be called great.

Publishers Weekly

Born in the Midwest but predominantly known as a founding poet of the San Francisco renaissance, Rexroth (1905-1982) wrote from deep within multiple traditions of world literature, Eastern and Western philosophy, and radical politics. Rexroth published many of his 54 books with New Directions, and while a good number are in print, some editions are more than 30 years old. This volume, scrupulously edited by novelist and poet Morrow (Ariel's Crossing) and poet and Copper Canyon publisher Hammill, brings much disparate and previously uncollected material together chronologically, including Rexroth's brilliant long poem "The Dragon and the Unicorn." The difficulty of assigning Rexroth a comfortable place on syllabi contributes to his current invisibility: some of Rexroth's earliest efforts in verse are cubist-influenced (some were included in Zukofsky's "Objectivist" issue of Poetry magazine), but Rexroth made a decision to make his poetry less opaque relatively early in his career, creating a technique that mixed a classical structure with a romantic sensibility. From "Between Myself and Death": "A fervor parches you sometimes,/ And you hunch over it, silent,/ Cruel, and timid; and sometimes/ You are frightened with wantonness,/ And give me your desperation./ Mostly we lurk in our coverts,/ Protecting our spleens, pretending/ That our bandages are our wounds." Though Rexroth published translations from Greek, French, Chinese, and Japanese (including Japanese women writers, extremely rare for the time), this edition is obliged to exclude them. While a tireless promoter of younger poets and neglected contemporaries, Rexroth is largely remembered as the "father of the Beat generation" (a label he repeatedly rejected as when he told Time magazine, "An entomologist is not a bug"), but he was, and remains, a great poet in his own right. (Dec.) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

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