Style is the material body of lyric poetry, Helen Vendler suggests. To cast off an earlier style is to do an act of viol
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English Pages 116 [111] Year 1995
The Breaking of Style HOPKINS
HEANEY GRAHAM
Helen Vendler
Harvard University Press Cambridge, Massachusetts
London, England 1995
Copyright © [995 by the President jud Fciknvs of Harvard College All rights reserved Printed in the United Stares of Anterior
Library of Congress Catalqgwg'in-fitbHcatmi item
Vendkr, Helen Hcnncssy. The breaking ofstyle: Hopldns, Heaney, Graham / Helen Vcudler, cm,—{The
Richard EHniann lectures in modern literature) lSTtST 0-674 oSizu-li (elothr alk. paper). LSB-N 0-674-oS12 E-S (pbk.r alk. paper) ]. Rnglish poetry History and criticism. 1. Hopkins, Gerard Manley, Heaney, Style, Style. 5. Seam us Style. 4. Graham, Joric, 195E— 1344-1S89 4. English language—Style, I, Title, II. Series: Richard Mmnnn lectures in inode ri> literature PR504.V46 1595
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liii.009—dcao
95-4665 CIP
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Acknowledgments
This book was given as the Richard Film ami Memorial Lectures (1994) at Emory University, I am most grateful to Professor Ronald Schuehard for his memorable hospitality on the occasion of my stay,
My editors at Harvard University' Press, Margarerta Fulton and Maria Asdic r, have made the creation of this book a pleasure, 1 am indebted to Susan Wei by for devoted assistance with manuscript preparation, Author and publisher arc grateful for permission to use the fol¬ lowing material:
Manley Hopkins, ed. Norman Mackenzie(London, 1990), reprinted by permission of Oxford University Press. Excerpts from “Settings” xix and “Settings” xxiv from Seeing lbinjjs, by Seamus Heaney, copyright © 1991 by Seamus Heaney; and excerpts from “Oysters,” “Clearance” [5], “Field Work”[IV], “The Gran baHe Man,” and “Terminus” from Selected Poems,176611/87, by Seamus Heaney, copyright © 1990 bv Seamus Heaney; all reprinted by permission of Farrar, Straus & Giroux, Tnc., and Citations from The Poetical Works of Gerard
Faber and Faber.
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Acknowledgments
“The Dream