Revienes
471
The Poetry of Marianne Moore. By John M.
Slatin. University Park: Pennsylvania State Univ. Press. 1986. viii,
THE SAVAGE'S ROMANCE:
282 pp. $24.50.
tiile the title The Savage's Romance would seem more promising
for a book on James Dickey than on Marianne Moore, its selection is
one of the few weaknesses in this excellent study of the first twenty
years of Moore's poetic career. Deriving the phrase from her poem
"New York," Slatin takes it to suggest in that context the isolation
that Moore relinquished in order to engage with other writers and the
contemporary scene. Moore's conception of her relations with contemporary writers—particularly the male modernists. Pound, Williams,
Eliot, and Stevens (what about women like H.D. or Stein.?)—and with
her literary predecessors—particularly Americans, from the Puritans
through Emerson and Hawthorne to Henry James—is a central concern of the book. One of its most fascinating revelations is that the
quotations within Moore's poems need to be read as an "allusive code"
in which a quote alludes "not to the writer being quoted at the time
but rather to another figure" (p. 26); her poems can then be seen
as engaging indirectly in current debates being conducted by figures
like Pound, Williams, and Eliot over issues such as the validity of
rhyme, the distinction between poetry and prose, or the value of the
European literary tradition.
A clear introductory chapter presents Statin's major claims, a necessity since subsequent chapters focus on the details of interpreting
a few poems. Slatin divides what he regards as the years of Moore's
best work (1915-1936) into three phases, distinguished by her different formal strategies and her changing approach to her literary
relationships. From 1915 to 1920, Moore's sense of poetic identity was
based on resistance, especially to the influence of other writers; her
use of syllabic forms served to guarantee her distinctiveness. Between
1921 and 1925 (when she was living in Manhattan and associated with
The Dial) she strove for accommodation rather than resistance, partly
in response to reading Eliot's poetry and criticism; her use of free
verse and her increasing reliance on quotation indicate this desire not
to remain isolated. During and immediately following her term as
editor of The Dial (i 925-1929), Moore published no poetry. When
she resumed writing in 1932, she returned to syllabic forms and to a
sense of isolation, though now combined with a desire to use poetry
to reforge an ideal American community. After 1940, Slatin argues,
her civic concerns weakened her work, as she retreated from former
47^
American Literature
rigorous complexity in her wish to persuade a broad audience, and as
she adopted an increasingly nostalgic view of history.
Statin's periodization, for the most part persuasive, is supported
by extremely close readings of a few key poems from each period—
readings dependent on meticulous use of Moore's conversation notebook, reading diaries, early drafts, scrap albums, letters, and lectures,
as well as works she was reading in current litde magazines. This is,
then, a book that will be useful to serious students of Moore's writing,
not to^ those who want a quick reader's guide to the poems. In fact,'
Slatin's focus on the first published version of each of the poems he
discusses means that his readers may need to seek out versions or
even poems (such as "Roses Only," "Black Earth," "Half Deity")—not
in The Complete
P
p
Given the striking originality and ingenuity of many of Slatin's
general claims and of particular readings ("The Fish," for instance,
he interprets as a poem about war), his study will prove provocative.
Scholars are fortunate to have a book that examines with such thorough care and respect Moore's poems and her poetic development in
the context of literary modernism.
University of Wisconsin, Madison.
LYNN KELLER.
Paris, 1^00-1^40. By Shari Benstock.
Austin: Univ. of Texas Press. 1986. xi, 518 pp. $26.95.
WOMEN OF THE LEFT BANK:
Everybody knows that scores of American writers in the early
decades of the twentieth century left their native land. They setded
mainly in Paris and participated more or less in the highly selfconscious artistic movements that came to be known, collectively, as
Modernism. The movements' chief practitioners saw literary Modernism as universally relevant to the tragic condition of modern man,
a condition exacerbated by World War I but already evident at the
turn of the century.
It has only recently become clear that their pronoun "man" carried
gender-restrictive force. But, in fact, anxious as the male Modernists
were to escape the constraints of a materialistic and conventional
America, their views about the right relations between the sexes were
profoundly conservative. Indeed, they blamed the moralism, prudery,
and caution of American ways on the increasing female influence in
public life. And they imagined that in Europe they could live freely
like men—and write about doing it—in part because women knew
their places.