Reading W.S. Merwin in a New Century

“This is a pioneering study of Merwin which will become essential reading for anyone in the field. It works as an introductory text to those who are fairly unfamiliar with Merwin yet also has much to say to those who are informed about his work and overall career. It is notably strong on Merwin’s affinities with other poets and the essays are well-organised, into sections on affinities/influence, the significance of Zen and eco-poetics, the craft of poetry, and apocalypticism.”—Stephen Matterson, Professor of English, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland"This new book of exciting essays is an important intervention in Merwin scholarship, contributing to a reflowering of interest in Merwin's poetry."
—Steven Gould Axelrod, University of California, Riverside, USA
This edited collection explores the work of highly awarded and twice American Poet Laureate W. S. Merwin. Spanning Merwin’s early career, his mid-career success, his Hawaiian epic, his eco-poetry, his lesser-known later poetry and the influence of Buddhism on his work, the volume offers new perspectives on Merwin as a major poet. Exploring his works across the twentieth and twenty-first century, this collection presents Merwin as a necessary and contemporary poet. It emphasizes contemporary readings of Merwin as an environmental advocate, showing how his poetry seeks to help each reader re-establish an intimate relationship with the natural world. It also highlights how Merwin’s work presents our place in history as a pivotal moment of transition into a new era of international cooperation. This volume both celebrates his life and writing and takes scholarship on his work forward into the new century.
Cheri Colby Langdell, a member of the Emily Dickinson International Society, the Modernist Studies Association, and the Pacific Association of Ancient and Modern Languages, has published in the Emily Dickinson Journal and is the author of W.S. Merwin (1981) and Adrienne Rich: The Moment of Change (2004), as well as other books, reviews and articles. She has taught at the University of California, Riverside, and the University of Southern California, and in the UK at the University of Nottingham, the University of Leicester, Birkbeck University of London and Queen Mary University of London. She now teaches at East Los Angeles College and Los Angeles Valley College, USA.