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Literary Criticism General

The Modern Dilemma

Wallace Stevens, T.S. Eliot, and Humanism

by (author) Leon Surette

Publisher
McGill-Queen's University Press
Initial publish date
Jun 2008
Category
General
  • Hardback

    ISBN
    9780773533639
    Publish Date
    Jun 2008
    List Price
    $70.00
  • eBook

    ISBN
    9780773578449
    Publish Date
    Jun 2008
    List Price
    $59.95

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Description

Where Eliot's poetry is dominated by cultural, religious, and philosophical anxiety, Stevens' is bright, witty, and playful - and commonly dismissed as superficial. Surette demonstrates the seriousness of Stevens' life-long engagement with the modern dilemma of disbelief, showing that he, like Eliot, rejected the Humanist resolution. Surette proceeds by juxtaposing the two poets' responses in poetry and prose to the same texts and events: Marianne Moore's poetry, the Great War, Humanists and anti-Humanists, the Franco-Mexican Humanist Ramon Fernandez, Pure Poetry, and, finally, the gathering war clouds of the late 1930s.

About the author

Leon Surette has taught at the UBC (1962-4), the U. of Guelph (1966-70); Queen’s University, Kingston, Ont. (Visiting 1979-80), and Western until mandatory retirement in July 2004. He has published seven books, five currently available. The latest is Art in the Age of the Machine. Self-published Ebook, Amazon 2013.

Leon Surette's profile page