Repression And Recovery: Modern American Poetry & Politics Of Cultural Memory

by Cary Nelson

A poststructuralist literary history - Nelson's premise that the history of modernist culture is one we no longer know we have forgotten and he aims to recover the political questions many forgotten modern poets looked straight in the eye.

Genres: Politics, Nonfiction, Criticism, Poetry

264 pages, Paperback

First published October 31, 1989

Reviews

[Kristen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I agree with his argument, but he could have had the courtesy to throw in some chapter breaks every once in a while! Also, I'm just not into poetry and cover art as much as he is; i'm pretty sure no one is as in to cover art as this guy. Overall, I think he could have gotten his point across in a 20 page article with a suggested reading list at the end and I would have been much happier.

[Gabriel Germain · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nelson's book is eye-opening. If you think you have many books to read, think again, there are loads more. Nelson's reappropriation of the canon and literary history to include leftist movements of the early parts of the 20th century and many forcefully forgotten authors helps the reader to understand the falsification embedded in these concepts. While the canon is central to a country's culture, it still leaves out aspects of its history, literary and cultural. In that sense, Nelson recuperates important movements and hopes to give an equal look at other movements to foreground a new way of looking at literary history. Nelson is a must for students or scholars working on the 1900-1940 period and the American leftist movements attached to it.

[Eric · Rating 5 out of 5]

Cary Nelson is a genius. This book is a collection of poems of the "modern" era (up till 1945ish) from excellent sources. Some are underground (as the stuff transcribed from walls!) and some are from old communist party publications. The reproduction of the Langson Hughes stuff is fantastic. EXCELLENT.

[Lawrence · Rating 3 out of 5]

It seems almost perverse for a scholar to refuse to put chapters in their work, but the bits and pieces that I read guided by the index were quite helpful, and the author's overall agenda seems sound.