Lyric Shame: The “Lyric” Subject of Contemporary American Poetry

by Gillian White

Bringing a provocative perspective to the poetry wars that have divided practitioners and critics for decades, Gillian White argues that the sharp disagreements surrounding contemporary poetics have been shaped by “lyric shame”―an unspoken but pervasive embarrassment over what poetry is, should be, and fails to be.

Favored particularly by modern American poets, lyric poetry has long been considered an expression of the writer’s innermost thoughts and feelings. But by the 1970s the “lyric I” had become persona non grata in literary circles. Poets and critics accused one another of “identifying” with lyric, which increasingly bore the stigma of egotism and political backwardness. In close readings of Elizabeth Bishop, Anne Sexton, Bernadette Mayer, James Tate, and others, White examines the social and critical dynamics by which certain poems become identified as “lyric,” arguing that the term refers less to a specific literary genre than to an abstract way of projecting subjectivity onto poems. Arguments about whether lyric poetry is deserving of praise or censure circle around what White calls “the missing lyric object”: an idealized poem that is nowhere and yet everywhere, and which is the product of reading practices that both the advocates and detractors of lyric impose on poems. Drawing on current trends in both affect and lyric theory, Lyric Shame unsettles the assumptions that inform much contemporary poetry criticism and explains why the emotional, confessional expressivity attributed to American lyric has become so controversial.

Genres: Poetry

360 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 2014

Reviews

[Joey Gamble · Rating 5 out of 5]

A distinctly important and compelling metacommentary on the affective register of our practices of "lyric reading." Along with Jackson's *Dickinson's Misery*, this book is an absolutely necessary read for anyone reading poetry—within the academy or without—from any historical period (but especially the U.S. in the 20th- and 21st-centuries).

[Tristan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed Lyric Shame. It was an excellent historical overview of the lyric/anti-lyric arguments that motivated a lot of Language poetry's critique as well as a compelling argument that the lyric/anti-lyric framework is an inaccurate frame that reifys the "lyric-reading" strategies advocated by the New Critics and which the Langauge poets objected to so strongly. The thoretical explanation of her framing in terms of shame is laid out clearly and effectively in the introduction and then her readings of the poets are engaging and fit nicely with her historical/theoretical framing. I did think her fourth chapter was a little difficult to follow--attempting to cover too many different poets too quickly for me, especially since I am not intimately familiar with the work of any of them, though I have read poems by all of the people she discussed in the chapter. Her readings of Elizabeth Bishop and Bernadette Mayer's work really made me want to read the pieces she's focusing on (especially with the Mayer, who I am not really familiar with, but who White presents as navigating the tension between avant-garde anti-lyric writing and "lyric" "personal" writing not only effectively and intentionally but with an almost mind-boggling degree of conscious concientiousness). Her reading of Sexton's work was also convincing and enjoyable, but I haven't had great luck with Sexton, personally, though I agree with her that Sexton's writing is much more than the uncritical and artless revelation of the self that it is often maligned as. (I also have not had good luck with Berryman or Lowell , have a mixed relationship with Snodgrass, and a positive-but-punctuated-with-disinterest-and-disappointment one with Plath so there's something particular about the so-called "Confessional" that doesn't always sit well with me that is not its "lyric" "personalness"). As such, she didn't actually change my mind on Sexton though I think the reading is admirable and points out some interesting aspects of her work.
All in all, a compelling work in poetics, weaving its historical and historicist analysis of poetic manifestos and reading practices with convincing close readings of the poems.

[Eve · Rating 5 out of 5]

really fascinating... if you have any interest in contemporary poetry (or, I would suggest, music, visual art, etc.), be sure to read this book... I am thinking about Robert Ashley's operas in relation to the issues raised here, and I am loving where it's taking me... really really interesting...

[Sarah Giragosian · Rating 5 out of 5]

I wish I had read this book years ago. It's absolutely necessary for any poet-scholar who studies twentieth c. North American poetics.

[Mills College Library]

811.5409 W5844 2014