What do you think?
Rate this book
Ground Work: Before the War/In the Dark
Robert Duncan's Groundwork , the American poet's unparalleled final masterpiece, is now available in a single volume. I am speaking now of the Dream in which America sleeps, the New World, moaning, floundering, in three hundred years of invasions, our own history out of Europe and enslaved Africa. Robert Duncan, from Groundwork
Robert Duncan has been widely venerated as one of America's most essential Allen Ginsberg described his poetry as "rapturous wonderings of inspiration," Gwendolyn Brooks called it "a subtle spice," and Susan Howe pointed to Duncan as "my precursor father," Lawrence Ferlinghetti said he "had the finest ear this side of Dante," and Robert Creeley called him "the magister, the singular Master of the Dance."
Now Duncan's magnum opus, Groundwork , is available in one groundbreaking edition. The first volume, Groundwork Before the War , was published in 1984, after a fifteen-year publishing silence, and received immediate it was nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award and won the first National Poetry Award for Duncan's "lifetime devotion to the art of poetry and his grand achievement...." The second volume, Groundwork In the Dark , was published in February 1988, the month of Duncan's death. The internationally renowned poet Michael Palmer has written a marvelous introduction for this new edition, where "the singlemindedness of [Duncan's] life's work shows itself in the confident energy of every line" ( Voice Literary Supplement ).
Robert Duncan has been widely venerated as one of America's most essential Allen Ginsberg described his poetry as "rapturous wonderings of inspiration," Gwendolyn Brooks called it "a subtle spice," and Susan Howe pointed to Duncan as "my precursor father," Lawrence Ferlinghetti said he "had the finest ear this side of Dante," and Robert Creeley called him "the magister, the singular Master of the Dance."
Now Duncan's magnum opus, Groundwork , is available in one groundbreaking edition. The first volume, Groundwork Before the War , was published in 1984, after a fifteen-year publishing silence, and received immediate it was nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award and won the first National Poetry Award for Duncan's "lifetime devotion to the art of poetry and his grand achievement...." The second volume, Groundwork In the Dark , was published in February 1988, the month of Duncan's death. The internationally renowned poet Michael Palmer has written a marvelous introduction for this new edition, where "the singlemindedness of [Duncan's] life's work shows itself in the confident energy of every line" ( Voice Literary Supplement ).
- GenresPoetry
288 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2000
8 people are currently reading
67 people want to read
About the author
Robert Duncan
289 books61 followersRobert Edward Duncan (January 7, 1919 – February 3, 1988) was an American poet associated with any number of literary traditions and schools, Duncan is often identified with the poets of the New American Poetry and Black Mountain College. Duncan saw his work as emerging especially from the tradition of Pound, Williams and Lawrence. Duncan was a key figure in the San Francisco Renaissance.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
October 31, 2007
Continually reading. In the Dark is so much more personal than Before the War, but the poetics are similar.
Groundwork is a staggering collection that I keep near.
Groundwork is a staggering collection that I keep near.
Read
January 2, 2014///Spicer & Duncan should get a beautiful enemies treatment a la Epstein's study of O'Hara-Baraka. Maybe add Levertov to the mix. Think of them doing seances in Duncan's house in the 50s, both receiving Lorca as radios, splitting into bars (Spicer) & tea parties w/Helen Adams (Duncan).
/// Mythopoetic in Duncan as of course ridiculous/antique on the outside but also an extension of the real practice of his family. & when yr in it not much is as compelling as his portrait of the hive in "Structure of Rime XXVII." It's all about the bees man cf Caesar's Gate.
/// "Do I really want the thunder of this hour, / this mouth my mouth seeks, this tongue" (190) / Have heard complaint RE: Duncan's later poems, how they get same-y, revolve around the same themes. Consider their relationship to Spicer's idealization of the poem "with an infinitely small vocabulary." & also the vulnerability of these poems at the end of his life vs earlier vatic "thunder."
/// Mythopoetic in Duncan as of course ridiculous/antique on the outside but also an extension of the real practice of his family. & when yr in it not much is as compelling as his portrait of the hive in "Structure of Rime XXVII." It's all about the bees man cf Caesar's Gate.
/// "Do I really want the thunder of this hour, / this mouth my mouth seeks, this tongue" (190) / Have heard complaint RE: Duncan's later poems, how they get same-y, revolve around the same themes. Consider their relationship to Spicer's idealization of the poem "with an infinitely small vocabulary." & also the vulnerability of these poems at the end of his life vs earlier vatic "thunder."
October 11, 2008
simply astonishing
January 9, 2019
Robert Duncan, on his birthday January 7
Poet, mystic, champion of human rights, and anarchist, Robert Duncan sought to forge through language a grammar of cosmic design and its possibilities for becoming human.
He wrote the groundbreaking 1944 essay The Homosexual in Society, 25 years before Stonewall, in which he compares historically oppressed minorities who are violently excluded on the basis of race and religion with those of sex and gender. As a structural analysis of power, identity, and state terror, it applies broadly as an indictment of authorized force and exclusivity.
Ground Work I: Before the War, Ground Work II: In the Dark , and his Selected Poems are superb exemplars of his strange gnostic-modernist-surrealist poetic art, steeped in myth, mysteries, Jungian archetypal psychology, and the occult. Raised as a Theosophist and a lifelong adherent and connoisseur of the esoteric and the ecstatic, his poetry may be read as grimoires of magic and belong to the tradition of medieval occult manuscripts.
The H.D. Book is an ars poetica and manifesto which celebrates the work of the poet H.D., who figures as a Beatrice-like guide of the soul in the great Dante-esque and Orphic dreamquest that was his life and work.
An influential figure of the San Francisco Renaissance, his impact on literature, psychology, and American culture is depicted wonderfully in the book On Opening the Dreamway by James Hillman, the psychologist who reimagined Jung's theories in the context of classical Greek mythology as a living faith. In this work the conversations of Duncan, Hillman, and others are recorded as a modern version of Plato's Dialogues.
Poet, mystic, champion of human rights, and anarchist, Robert Duncan sought to forge through language a grammar of cosmic design and its possibilities for becoming human.
He wrote the groundbreaking 1944 essay The Homosexual in Society, 25 years before Stonewall, in which he compares historically oppressed minorities who are violently excluded on the basis of race and religion with those of sex and gender. As a structural analysis of power, identity, and state terror, it applies broadly as an indictment of authorized force and exclusivity.
Ground Work I: Before the War, Ground Work II: In the Dark , and his Selected Poems are superb exemplars of his strange gnostic-modernist-surrealist poetic art, steeped in myth, mysteries, Jungian archetypal psychology, and the occult. Raised as a Theosophist and a lifelong adherent and connoisseur of the esoteric and the ecstatic, his poetry may be read as grimoires of magic and belong to the tradition of medieval occult manuscripts.
The H.D. Book is an ars poetica and manifesto which celebrates the work of the poet H.D., who figures as a Beatrice-like guide of the soul in the great Dante-esque and Orphic dreamquest that was his life and work.
An influential figure of the San Francisco Renaissance, his impact on literature, psychology, and American culture is depicted wonderfully in the book On Opening the Dreamway by James Hillman, the psychologist who reimagined Jung's theories in the context of classical Greek mythology as a living faith. In this work the conversations of Duncan, Hillman, and others are recorded as a modern version of Plato's Dialogues.
March 20, 2011
"...a million reapers come to cut down
the leaves of grass we hoped to live by
except we give ourselves utterly over to the
end of things."
Robert Duncan was a beautiful poet, and his work is still beautiful. This book, apparently his last, is no exception. Duncan is the only poet I've ever read who manages to be modern and concrete at the same time as being almost insanely metaphysical and weird. He's a deeply gifted lyricist, but applies this gift to poems with titles like 'Fragments of an Albigensian Rime'. I mean, what the hell does 'Albigensian' mean? And, more importantly, who on earth besides Robert Duncan and maybe Gandolph could possibly care? And yet, somehow, maybe by the depth and honesty of his poetic commitment, it's beautiful.
Duncan is one of my favorite poets, and I have to really think hard about why that is. It's like if William Blake had lived in San Francisco in the early 70s with a younger man and a little more restraint. Reading this book, at times, reminded me of that documentary on Robert Crum, when his brother goes insane writing comic books full of nonsensical text. I half-expected Duncan's more 18th-century prose to just start crowding out the poems like one of Crum's brother's squashed cartoons.
Ultimately, this book is strange and difficult, and most people who pick it up will find themselves skipping through it to find his best later work. But that's fine. It's in there.
the leaves of grass we hoped to live by
except we give ourselves utterly over to the
end of things."
Robert Duncan was a beautiful poet, and his work is still beautiful. This book, apparently his last, is no exception. Duncan is the only poet I've ever read who manages to be modern and concrete at the same time as being almost insanely metaphysical and weird. He's a deeply gifted lyricist, but applies this gift to poems with titles like 'Fragments of an Albigensian Rime'. I mean, what the hell does 'Albigensian' mean? And, more importantly, who on earth besides Robert Duncan and maybe Gandolph could possibly care? And yet, somehow, maybe by the depth and honesty of his poetic commitment, it's beautiful.
Duncan is one of my favorite poets, and I have to really think hard about why that is. It's like if William Blake had lived in San Francisco in the early 70s with a younger man and a little more restraint. Reading this book, at times, reminded me of that documentary on Robert Crum, when his brother goes insane writing comic books full of nonsensical text. I half-expected Duncan's more 18th-century prose to just start crowding out the poems like one of Crum's brother's squashed cartoons.
Ultimately, this book is strange and difficult, and most people who pick it up will find themselves skipping through it to find his best later work. But that's fine. It's in there.
January 12, 2016
Read this for an English graduate course.
While the poetry of the Black Mountain writers was not - generally - my favourite, I quickly fell in love with Duncan's poems. It's rare to find such an eclectic mix of mythology, religion, science, and personal confessions anywhere else. Duncan's use of intertexts and spiraling form are also apparent throughout. "In the Dark" has a more dispersed feel than "Before the War," and deals very sincerely with Duncan's own illness near the end of his life.
While the poetry of the Black Mountain writers was not - generally - my favourite, I quickly fell in love with Duncan's poems. It's rare to find such an eclectic mix of mythology, religion, science, and personal confessions anywhere else. Duncan's use of intertexts and spiraling form are also apparent throughout. "In the Dark" has a more dispersed feel than "Before the War," and deals very sincerely with Duncan's own illness near the end of his life.
July 21, 2007
My copy is only "Before the War," but it's still great. Very uneven, but brilliant, like most Duncan.
August 1, 2007
also great to line up with reading Devin Johnston's wonderful book on poetry as an occult practice . . .
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews