The Poetry of Robert Lowell: A Preface

Abstract

It would be an exaggeration to say that critics have already exhausted every aspect of Lowell's poetry, so that later critics must search in vain for subjects for their research on Lowell. But Steven Axelrod's Robert Lowell: A Reference Guide(1983) proves that a great number of books and articles have been written on Lowell, and that they have ransacked almost all the corners of Lowell's life and poetry. On the other hand, the shelves of Lowell criticism make it clear that the general mystery of Lowell's art─how Lowell manages to transform idiosyncratic personality and private experiences in the superindustrialized society into compelling art, a poetry which strikes deep in such a varied audience─is very hard to penetrate. Unless we can locate clear, coherent, valid principles at the center of his art, all efforts to speak of Lowell in the usual ways─discussions on his alienation from the society, dynamic ambivalence, apostasy, Calvinism, literary inheritance, discovery of "confessional" mode, etc.─may evaporate in time.