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The Alvarez Generation: Thom Gunn, Geoffrey Hill, Ted Hughes, Sylvia Plath, and
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The Alvarez Generation: Thom Gunn, Geoffrey Hill, Ted Hughes, Sylvia Plath, and Peter Porter Hardcover - 2015 - 1st Edition

by William Wootten


From the publisher

This book is the biography of a taste in poetry and its consequences. During the 1950s and 1960s, a generation of poets appeared who would eschew the restrained manner of Movement poets such as Philip Larkin, a generation who would, in the words of the introduction to A. Alvarez's classic anthology The New Poetry, take poetry 'Beyond the Gentility Principle'. This was the generation of Thom Gunn, Geoffrey Hill, Ted Hughes, Sylvia Plath and Peter Porter.

William Wootten explores what these five poets shared in common, their connections, critical reception, rivalries and differences, and locates what was new and valuable in their work. The Alvarez Generation is an important re-evaluation of a time when contemporary poetry and its criticism had a cultural weight it has now lost and when a 'new seriousness' was to become closely linked to questions of violence, psychic unbalance and, most controversially of all, suicide.

A new Afterword contains important biographical information on Sylvia Plath and reflects on its implications both for the discussions contained in the book and for the study of Plath's work more generally.

Details

  • Title The Alvarez Generation: Thom Gunn, Geoffrey Hill, Ted Hughes, Sylvia Plath, and Peter Porter
  • Author William Wootten
  • Binding Hardcover
  • Edition number 1st
  • Edition 1
  • Pages 224
  • Volumes 1
  • Language ENG
  • Publisher Liverpool University Press
  • Date 2015-06-01
  • Features Bibliography, Index
  • ISBN 9781781381632 / 1781381631
  • Weight 1.1 lbs (0.50 kg)
  • Dimensions 9.5 x 6.4 x 0.8 in (24.13 x 16.26 x 2.03 cm)
  • Themes
    • Aspects (Academic): Historical
    • Chronological Period: 20th Century
    • Cultural Region: British
  • Library of Congress subjects English poetry, English poetry - 20th century - History and
  • Library of Congress Catalog Number 2015374922
  • Dewey Decimal Code 821.914

About the author

William Wootten is a literary journalist, writing for the London Review of Books, the Times Literary Supplement and the Guardian. He is Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Bristol.
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Hardback. New. The biography of a taste in poetry and its consequences. Exploration of the generation of poets anthologized in A. Alvarez's classic The New Poetry - Thom Gunn, Geoffrey Hill, Ted Hughes, Sylvia Plath and Peter Porter. A new afterword casts fresh light on the biography of Sylvia Plath and discusses its implications.
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The Alvarez Generation � Thom Gunn, Geoffrey Hill, Ted Hughes, Sylvia Plath, and Peter Porter
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The Alvarez Generation – Thom Gunn, Geoffrey Hill, Ted Hughes, Sylvia Plath, and Peter Porter
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The Alvarez Generation: Thom Gunn, Geoffrey Hill, Ted Hughes, Sylvia Plath, and Peter Porter
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The Alvarez Generation : Thom Gunn, Geoffrey Hill, Ted Hughes, Sylvia Plath, and Peter Porter

The Alvarez Generation : Thom Gunn, Geoffrey Hill, Ted Hughes, Sylvia Plath, and Peter Porter

by Wootten, William

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Liverpool : Liverpool University Press, 2015. First Edition. Hardcover. SIGNED and inscribed to Peter & Christine Porter. Fine cloth copy in a near-fine, very slightly edge-nicked and dust-dulled dust-wrapper. Remains particularly well-preserved overall; tight, bright, clean and strong. Physical description; 228 pages : 24 cm. Notes; Includes bibliographical references and index. Contents; Cover -- Contents -- Acknowledgements -- Preface -- PART I -- Chapter One: Beginnings: Oxford and Cambridge Poetry in the Early 1950s -- Chapter Two: Violent Times: Anti-Movement Poetry in the Mid to Late 1950s -- Chapter Three: In Opposite Directions: A. Alvarez and Thom Gunn -- Chapter Four: Against Gentility -- Chapter Five: On Being Serious -- Chapter Six: Anthology-Making -- Chapter Seven: First Reactions: The Review Debate and the Initial Response to The New Poetry -- PART II -- Chapter Eight: Sylvia Plath -- PART III -- Chapter Nine: Going to Extremes -- Chapter Ten: 'A Study of Suicide' -- PART IV --… Read More
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