The Broken Tower: A Life of Hart Crane - Hardcover

Mariani, Paul

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0393047261 ISBN 13: 9780393047264

Publisher: W W Norton & Co Inc, 1999

Synopsis

The award-winning author of Lost Puritan and A New World Naked presents a close-up look at the turbulent and tragically short life of American poet Hart Crane, from his youth, to his turbulent life amid the New York gay scene, to his suicide at the age of thirty-two.

About this title

Review:

In addition to several volumes of poetry, Paul Mariani has also written biographies of major 20th-century American poets: William Carlos Williams, Robert Lowell, and John Berryman. In his fourth biography, he takes on the life of Hart Crane (1899-1932), a contemporary of Williams who held a similarly pivotal role in the development of American literature's avant-garde. "It would be difficult," Mariani suggests, "to find a serious poet or reader of poetry in this country today who has not been touched by something in Hart Crane's music." (However, at the time, many critics--with some of whom he had strained personal relationships--did not evaluate his work so highly, which contributed in part to Crane's dramatic suicidal leap off a ship at sea.) Crane loved New York, moving there from his hometown of Cleveland as soon as he could; even when financial straits forced him to return home to work for his father, the "white buildings" of Manhattan loomed in his imagination. The Broken Tower does a fine job of recreating the passionate energy and vitality of Crane's life. Mariani weaves lines from Crane's letters and poems into his narrative throughout, and while he does not skimp in his accounts of the poet's alcoholism and promiscuous sex life with other men, he treats these matters simply as components of the poet's complex personality.

About the Author:

Paul Mariani is the author of thirteen books, among them biographies of Robert Lowell (Lost Puritan), John Berryman (Dream Song), and William Carlos Williams (A New World Naked), a finalist for the National Book Award, a New York Times Editors' Choice for ten weeks, and one of the New York Times's top 100 books of the year. An acclaimed poet, Mariani has written collections of poetry, including Salvage Operations and, most recently, The Great Wheel.

About this edition

• Publisher: W W Norton & Co Inc
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0393047261
• ISBN 13: 9780393047264
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 492