Description:
Reading the Difficulties: Dialogues with Contemporary American Innovative Poetry brings together leading poets and critics to examine the challenges and possibilities of reading experimental and innovative verse. Edited by Thomas Fink and Judith Halden-Sullivan, this thought-provoking collection explores how contemporary poetry reshapes traditional expectations of meaning, interpretation, and reader engagement. Through essays, case studies, and critical reflections on influential poets and texts, the volume offers practical and theoretical approaches to understanding poetry that intentionally resists conventional forms of comprehension. This book will appeal to literary scholars, poets, creative writing students, educators, contemporary literature researchers, poetry enthusiasts, and readers interested in avant-garde and experimental writing.
Review Quotes: "The question of how to read difficult poetry (in this case, poetry written explicitly in the Modernist, or avant-garde, tradition) is a familiar subject, so a volume of this kind is a significant contribution to the field." -- Joel Bettridge, author of Reading as Belief: Language Writing, Poetics, Faith