Hart Crane: The Contexts of "The Bridge" (Cambridge Studies in American Literature and Culture)

When Hart Crane's epic poem The Bridge was published in 1930, it was generally judged a failure. Critics said the poet had unwisely attempted to create a mystical synthesis of modern America out of inadequate materials. Crane himself, who committed suicide in 1932, did little to correct this impression, and many people still find the poem unsatisfactory. In this startling and exhaustive analysis of The Bridge Paul Giles shows that Crane was consciously constructing his poem out of a huge number of puns and paradoxes, most of which have until now never been noticed. He also shows how. Crane was directly influenced by James Joyce (the composition of The Bridge ran parallel to the first serialisation of Finnegans Wake) and he suggests a number of other contexts which illuminate the poem: Einstein and relativity, Freud and psychoanalysis, bootlegging, burlesque theatre, Hollywood cinema.Paul Giles is the author of 'Hart Crane: The Contexts of "The Bridge" (Cambridge Studies in American Literature and Culture)', published 1986 under ISBN 9780521320740 and ISBN 0521320747.