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The Missouri Review

Nonfiction | June 01, 1984

Critical Theory and Contemporary American Poetry

Hank Lazer

The full text of this essay is not currently available online.

Some time ago T.S. Eliot impatiently (and correctly) declared that “criticism is as inevitable as breathing.” Perhaps the contemporary equivalent would be the proclamation that theorizing is as inevitable as breathing.  Indeed, a quick glance at MLA job lists or ads for new books of literary criticism quickly convinces us that all “serious” English departments must have specialists in critical theory and that graduate students and literary scholars must have training in critical theory.  My intent is not to trace the rise of critical theory in current academic curricula, but to ask about a different relationship: what is, or what ought to be, the relationship between critical theory and contemporary American poetry?

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SEE THE ISSUE

7.3 Cover

ISSUE

spring 1984

7.3 (Spring 1984)

Featuring work by Russell Banks, Bruce Beasley, George Bogin, Christopher Buckley, Dino Campana, Rene Char, Fred Chappell, Reed Way Dasenbrock, Glover Davis, Robb Forman Dew, Katherine Estill, Kathy Fagan, Carol Frost, Margo Glantz, Daniel Halpern, Laura Hendrie, Katherine Kane, Hank Lazer, Michael Milburn, Ricardo Pau-Llosa, Omar Pound, Pattiann Rogers, Philippe Soupault… as well as an interview with Charles Simic and a special feature on Tennessee Williams.

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