At the time of his death in 1935, Edwin Arlington Robinson was regarded as the leading American poet-the equal of Frost and Stevens. In this biography, Scott Donaldson tells the intriguing story of this poet’s life, based in large part on a previously unavailable trove of more than 3,000 personal letters, and recounts his profoundly important role in the development of modern American literature. Born in 1869, the youngest son of a well-to-do family in Gardiner, Maine, Robinson had two brothers: Dean, a doctor who became a drug addict, and Herman, an alcoholic who squandered the family fortune. Robinson never married, but he fell in love as many as three times, most lastingly with the woman who would become his brother Herman’s wife. Despite his shyness, Robinson made many close friends, and he repeatedly went out of his way to give them his support and encouragement. Still, it was always poetry that drove him. He regarded writing poems as nothing less than his calling-what he had been put on earth to do. Struggling through long years of poverty and neglect, he achieved a voice and a subject matter all his own. He was the first to write about ordinary people and events-an honest butcher consumed by grief, a miser with “eyes like little dollars in the dark,” ancient clerks in a dry goods store measuring out their days like bolts of cloth. In simple yet powerful rhetoric, he explored the interior worlds of the people around him. Robinson was a major poet and a pivotal figure in the course of modern American literature, yet over the years his reputation has declined. With his biography, Donaldson returns this remarkable talent to the pantheon of great American poets and sheds new light on his enduring legacy.
Editorial Reviews
Review
[A] readable and well-researched book.–Rebecca Porte “Minneapolis Star Tribune”
[A] sterling biography.–David Yezzi “Wall Street Journal”
[Donaldson’s] thorough documentation and responsiveness to Robinson’s poetry displaces previous accounts of this fascinating, enigmatic character.–William H. Pritchard “Times Literary Supplement”
A richly documented book that eclipses earlier biographies.–Bruce Allen “Down East: The Magazine of Maine”
A smoothly readable, profoundly well-documented biography.–X. J. Kennedy “The New Criterion”
A thoroughgoing biography that will likely become a touchstone for anyone interested in the poet’s work and life. Recommended.–Pam Kingsbury “Library Journal”
Donaldson’s words, like his subjects, are always heartfelt.– “Republic”
If [Robinson’s] reputation is ever to revive, and it should, the credit ought to go to Scott Donaldson and his biography.–Charles Simic “New York Review of Books”
Mr. Donaldson’s close readings of the poems are masterful and edifying.–Ernest Hilbert “The New York Sun”
Scott Donaldson has been able to give us a superb accounting of the life of a major 20th century poet.–Hannah Merker “Maine Sunday Telegram”
Unquestionably, Robinson’s life and poetry are worthy of celebration.
A Poet’s Life offers the reader a chance to participate in that celebration.–John Shulson “Virginia Gazette”
About the Author
Scott Donaldson is one of the nation’s leading literary biographers. He has written and edited a number of books, including Poet in America: Winfield Townley Scott; By Force of Will: The Life and Art of Ernest Hemingway; Fool for Love: F. Scott Fitzgerald; John Cheever: A Biography; Archibald MacLeish: An American Life; and Hemingway vs. Fitzgerald.
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