Visions & Affiliations: A California Literary Time Line Part One

Literary Nonficton. Poetry History & Criticism. California Studies. VISIONS & AFFILIATIONS: A CALIFORNIA TIMELINE 1940-1980 is the first of a two-volume chronoencyclopedia of a scene that stretches over sixty-five years. People, ideas, and stories appear, disappear, and reappear as the second half of the century moves forward. Poetry is a major element in this kaleidoscopic California scene. It is argued about, dismissed, renewed, denounced in fury, asserted as divine, criticized as pornographic. Poetry is as Western as the Sierra foothills, and the questions raised here go to its very heart. Beginning with the publication of Kenneth Rexroth's first book, this all-encompassing history-as-collage plunges us forward into the 21st Century. California authors keep generating massive anthologies in an attempt to tame the chaos of California, to pretend it isn't there. Yet there it is—staring them in the face like a great bear, alive, hungry and more than a little dangerous.