Description: Leonard Cohen's artistic career is unique. Most poets and novelists do not become rock stars. No other rock star's career peaked in their eighth decade as Leonard Cohen's did. Cohen's popularity is still growing following his death. In The World of Leonard Cohen, a team of international scholars and writers explore the various dimensions of the artist's life, work, persona, and legacy to offer an authoritative and accessible summation of Cohen's extraordinary career. His relation to key themes and topics - Judaism, Buddhism, Christianity, Zen and the East, the Folk tradition, Rock & Roll, Canadian and world literature, film - are all addressed. The World of Leonard Cohen offers a comprehensive, uniquely informed and wholly fresh account of this iconic songwriter and artist, whose singular voice has permanently altered our cultural landscape.
Brief description: David R. Shumway is Professor of English, and Literary and Cultural Studies. He is the author of American Narrative Realism: The Novel, Film, Television, and Theater, to be published by Cambridge University Press in 2026. He wrote Rock Star: The Making of Musical Icons from Elvis to Springsteen and contributed to The World of Bob Dylan, The Cambridge Companion to Bob Dylan, and The Cambridge Companion to the Singer-Songwriter.
Review Quotes: 'A book of intelligent, readable and useful essays that explore and show the strengths and depths of Cohen's poems and songs, and how they have fitted into various musical, social and spiritual contexts since he first arrived on the scene' Irish Independent