Reading Duncan Reading

Book excerpt: Collis and Lyons (Simon Fraser University, Canada) enlist US and a few international contributors in English, American studies, and poetry to probe the poetry of Robert Duncan. Part 1 traces a variety of Duncan's influences and derivations. Some topics include textual poetics and the politics of reading in Duncan's "Night Scenes," and poetic abdication in Duncan and Laura Riding. Part 2 examines poets who in some way derive from Duncan, with discussion of quotation in the poetry of Duncan and Ronald Johnson, Jerome Rothenberg and the dream of "A Poetry of All Poetries," and anarchism and the practice of derivative poetics in Duncan and John Cage. Annotation ©2013 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com).