The Fortunes of Poetry in an Age of Unmaking By James Matthew Wilson Hardcover 0692556931 9780692556931 The Fortunes of Poetry in an Age of Unmaking This brilliant book powerfully demonstrates how the evolution of Modern and Post Modern criticism and theory, free verse, and political ideology have greatly diminished contemporary poetry. The final chapter is a tour de force that compellingly argues for meter as the catalyst that joins syllables, accents, and (often) rhyme to create the deeply subtle artistry of our languages poetry. What is poetry and what is poetry for? To ask the first question is to ask the second. To answer both in light of the western tradition stretching back to Homer, and against much modernist and postmodernist poetic theory and practice, is the goal of this remarkable book. Poetrys final end is nothing less than to arouse in us a profound sense of wonder in coming to know that Reality as a whole is formed as the good world order, the intelligible beauty showing forth from [the] cosmic circle of procession and return.—David Middleton, author of The Fiddler of Driskill Hill , in The American Conservative

This brilliant book powerfully demonstrates how the evolution of Modern and Post Modern criticism and theory free verse and political ideology have greatly diminished contemporary poetry The final chapter is a tour de force that compellingly argues for meter as the catalyst that joins syllables accents and often rhyme to create the deeply subtle artistry of our language s poetry What is poetry and what is poetry for To ask the first question is to ask the second To answer both in light of the western tradition stretching back to Homer and against much modernist and postmodernist poetic theory and practice is the goal of this remarkable book Poetry s final end is nothing less than to arouse in us a profound sense of wonder in coming to know that Reality as a whole is formed as the good world order the intelligible beauty showing forth from the cosmic circle of procession and return David Middleton author of The Fiddler of Driskill Hill in The American Conservative The Fortunes of Poetry in an Age of UnmakingIn The Fortunes of Poetry Wilson not only presents an incisive critique of contemporary critical and poetic trends that tend to frustrate amateur readers and the general public but much importantlyy spends the bulk of the booking seeking to define pure poetry what is the essence of poetry Is it language without social or economic use Is it prose delineated confusingly on a page Is it simply metrical composition The final chapter is to my mind the most valuable of the book in that is provides Wilson s quite inclusive response All in all poetry must be understood not as something apart from tradition reducible to one element or as a means of shocking or rejecting society but as a certain gift of the gods a paradigmatic art which with good reason makes use of memory meter and metaphor but is not reducible to any of these Good poetry Wilson contends is still being written and innovated by many poets today but these poets are good only to the extent that they value and utilize the traditional craft of poetry Philosophically erudite surprisingly inclusive wittily penned Wilson s book is well worth the read for anyone interested in poetry or criticism The Fortunes of Poetry in an Age of Unmaking This is a revolutionary book It s words work as an awakening our most vital art poetry A reformation and a call to arms I couldn t praise it The book s association of beauty poetry and God take it from good to great I recommend it to all poets All writers All artists And all Christians Deep and thought provoking material I look forward to reading from this profound author Loved it The Fortunes of Poetry in an Age of Unmaking The death wish contemporary world extends far far beyond the literary cabinet but a world of creativity a world given over to the slow cultivation of craft of form and invention that leads to growth self giving and new life is one worth defending This book is one of the most sane and eloquent defenses of poetry as primarily a metrical practice that I have ever readon par with Timothy Steele s Missing Measures Wilson however does not hold back in throwing pointed barbs at the proliferation of academic postmodern free verse that is so often unlovely and soulless because it s quest for novelty through fragmentation only results in a dulling sameness of incoherence. In this book Wilson s Aristotelian Thomistic approach to the history of poetry makes us believe again in the possibility of an art that can participate in the Good the True and the Beautiful without shame and without that smug post human irony that too quickly and too often turns its nose up at meter traditional form light verse or rhyme as a fetter on artistic liberation The Fortunes of Poetry in an Age of Unmaking A defence of poetry as metrical rather than just a stream of words arranged on a page. More to follow The Fortunes of Poetry in an Age of Unmaking Still thinking about it The Fortunes of Poetry in an Age of Unmaking

The Fortunes of Poetry in an Age of Unmaking By James Matthew Wilson

0692556931

9780692556931

English

292

Hardcover

James Matthew Wilson is Professor of Humanities and the Founding Director of the Master of Fine Arts program in Creative Writing at the University of Saint Thomas Houston An award winning scholar of philosophical theology and literature he has authored dozens of essays articles and reviews on all manner of subjects secular and divine and especially on those where we see the two in their intrinsic relation as truth goodness beauty and being disclose themselves in art and culture in the political and intellectual life in our quest for self knowledge and the contemplation of God His scholarly work especially focuses on the meeting of aesthetic and ontological form where the craftsmanship of art work discloses the truth about be James Matthew Wilson is Professor of Humanities and the Founding Director of the Master of Fine Arts program in Creative Writing at the University of Saint Thomas Houston An award winning scholar of philosophical theology and literature he has authored dozens of essays articles and reviews on all manner of subjects secular and divine and especially on those where we see the two in their intrinsic relation as truth goodness beauty and being disclose themselves in art and culture in the political and intellectual life in our quest for self knowledge and the contemplation of God His scholarly work especially focuses on the meeting of aesthetic and ontological form where the craftsmanship of art work discloses the truth about being. Wilson is a poet and critic of contemporary poetry whose work appears regularly in such magazines and journals as First Things The Wall Street Journal The Hudson Review Modern Age The New Criterion Dappled Things Measure The Weekly Standard Front Porch Republic The Raintown Review National Review and The American Conservative. He has published ten books including six books and chapbooks of poetry Among his volumes are The Vision of the Soul Truth Goodness and Beauty in the Western Tradition CUA 2017 the major critical study The Fortunes of Poetry in an Age of Unmaking Wiseblood 2015 and a monograph The Catholic Imagination in Modern American Poetry both Wiseblood Books 2014 His most recent books are The Strangeness of the Good Angelico 2020 and the poetic sequence The River of the Immaculate Conception Wiseblood 2019. Wilson serves as Poetry Editor of Modern Age magazine series editor of Colosseum Books of the Franciscan University at Steubenville Press and as director of the Colosseum Institute for writers He also serves on the boards of several learned journals and societies Twice Wilson has been awarded the Lionel Basney Award by the Conference for Christianity and Literature he has been a runner up for both the Foley Prize for Poetry by America magazine and the Jacques Maritain Essay Prize by Dappled Things magazine The Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture awarded him the 2017 Hiett Prize in the Humanities the largest award of its kind Wilson s The Strangeness of the Good won the Catholic Media Awards prize for poetry in 2021. D where he subsequently held a Sorin Research Fellowship Wilson joined the University of Saint Thomas Houston in 2021 when he co founded the Master of Fine Arts program site_link .

.Wilson was educated at the University of Michigan B.A the University of Massachusetts M.A and the University of Notre Dame M.F.A. Ph