Review “A comprehensive, well-researched, and beautifully written biography. . . . Jarnot brings Duncan to life as a gay man and a brilliant poet engaged with the cultural and political issues of his time.” (Publishers Weekly 2012-01-23)“An edifying study of a poet who did much to inspire the next generation of poets, and it is an entertaining life story. This book should be looked to as a template for other biographies of twentieth-century poets.” (Daniel Coffey Foreword 2012-09-01)“A chronicle that should be utterly absorbing for anyone interested in twentieth-century American poetry.” (Ray Olson Booklist 2012-08-01)“Jarnot's biography offers an eloquent testament to an American poet trying to be responsible to the human spirit. . . . It will compel us all to reread Duncan's poetry―breathtaking as it is.” (Seth Lerer San Francisco Chronicle 2012-08-27)“For many younger readers, the members of the post-World War II ‘San Francisco Renaissance,’ like their cohorts among the Black Mountain poets, are little more than names. . . . Posterity winnows ruthlessly, and, rightly or not, the American poets of the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s who seem to be passing into the canon are largely East Coast folk. . . . This makes Lisa Jarnot’s biography of Duncan all the more valuable.” (Michael Dirda Washington Post Book World 2013-02-28)“Jarnot has done her homework, and she gives readers an exhaustive, meticulously detailed account of Duncan’s life. . . . Highly recommended.” (Choice 2013-02-01)“In organizing a mass of previously unavailable archive material, Jarnot's study will serve as an indispensable reference text―if not the first port of call―for anyone hoping to make headway through the metaphysical tangle of Duncan's oeuvre. . . . Readers of Jarnot's biography will find Duncan's life realized, at last, in all its fictive certainty.” (Stephen Ross Times Literary Supplement (TLS) 2012-09-07)"Jarnot is a sensitive reader of literary history and an admiring but not uncritical biographer. She is also not above serving up the scuttlebutt that we’ve come, as readers, to expect as our literary-biographical due." (Robert Baird London Review of Books 2013-10-24)“Lisa Jarnot’s biography of Duncan should only stoke further interest in his work. She avoids the usual two pitfalls―worship and apostasy―by cleaving to a style so clean and free of editorializing or psychologizing that it reads like reportage. . . . The result is a book of just the facts: what, where, when and who. And yet Jarnot, a poet herself, is sensitive to the symbols and cycles that defined Duncan’s imaginative life.” (Ange Mlinko The Nation 2012-10-08) Read more From the Inside Flap “This is a book of wonders, beautifully written and brilliantly researched. Lisa Jarnot offers a work of devotion to the truth and spirit of Robert Duncan's life and art, the result of twenty years of study and reflection. A great story as well as a rigorous exploration of the poet's art of the imagination, it will pull readers back into Duncan's poetry at the same time that it recounts his rich, adventurous, and always creative life.”―Robert Adamson, author of The Goldfinches of Baghdad."Lisa Jarnot’s biography of Robert Duncan represents an essential contribution to our understanding of this complex, inspirited man, his life and art, and the many circles in which he moved through the years. It is one of those rare works that melds scholarly diligence with poetic comprehension."―Michael Palmer, author of Thread. "Robert Duncan was a poet of enormous means and complexity, one of the last to pursue a truly cosmological poetics. In that pursuit he was a poet (even a great poet), who created – like Whitman before him – his own life with all its openings & pitfalls as beyond all else a life-of-poetry. Lisa Jarnot's biography now gives us a first, richly detailed depiction of that life, a powerful and necessary complement to Duncan’s poetry itself. A product of the century behind us, it offers up a lasting legacy for the century to come."―Jerome Rothenberg, author of Technicians of the Sacred. Read more About the Author Lisa Jarnot is a poet and independent scholar. She has taught at Brooklyn College and the Naropa Institute and is the author of four books of poetry, including Ring of Fire and Night Scenes. Read more
S**.
Thoroughly researched and beautifully written biography of Robert Duncan
I knew Robert Duncan and was delighted by what Lisa Jarnot uncovered about his life and his poetry.
W**S
Definitive biography--and yet
Having grown up in California, I have always been interested in the San Francisco poets. This is a thorough biography of Robert Duncan, and I am sure quite reliable, yet it failed to catch fire for me. The connecting theme throughout is Duncan's marriage with the artist Jess, yet in the later chapters it devolves into a recitation of his various speaking tours--one after another, after another. The presentation of this side of his life would have benefited from more selectivity. Duncan was very dutiful about educating himself, a lifelong practice. Yet even though this book quotes copiously from his poetry and prose, I emerged unconvinced that he was in fact a major writer. For Duncan addicts, though, it will be invaluable.
J**E
R.D. in the world.
Since Robert was- and is- an almost mythological character for me I was fascinated with the book and impressed at the amount of solid research Lisa did to write it. I knew Robert but even knowing him in real life he was like a minor god-flawed as the gods often are, but a larger than life character. He comes through this book as great and as occasionally petulent as he could be, both. But the purity of his dedication (obedience- his word) to poetry shines. Good work, Lisa Jarnot.Judith Roche
B**E
Beautifully written biography of a poet by a poet
Jarnot writes like a charm. The book is deeply researched and reflects the depth and breadth of her poetic gifts, making her a great match for her subject. Jarnot would have been one of Duncan's circle if chronos had allowed.
J**H
Robert Duncan, The Ambassador from Venus: A...
I have just started this book. It is very interesting
T**L
Four Stars
An unwitting road map to a man that seldom truly knew or understood.
J**D
The man
ALL ABOUT DUNCAN
P**A
Tedium vitae
I've had a lifelong commitment to both poetry and the work of Robert Duncan. This biography was NOT written in the spirit one would have expected of this poet. But instead invites the reader into the inevitable day to day tedium involved in becoming a major American poet. In fact, when I first became aware of this biography I had quickly noted the closed nature of Lisa Jarnot more than I recognized the open nature of Robert Duncan. And I was indeed surprised and not in a positive way. That said, I will say she faithfully carried out her task of turning Robert Duncan into a professor of literature with her assiduity rather than imaginatively placing him among the pantheon of neglected american intellectual giants which is how I will always know him. I will say this though, she chose a wonderful title to remark on the man and his genius. But one need go no further than imbibing this title to edify oneself.
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