Categories
Follow Harriet on Twitter
About Harriet
- The Poetry Foundation's blog for poetry and related news.
- More about Harriet
- Contributors
- Archive
Blogroll
“Battlefield” unearthed…and more on Frank Stanford
I’d love to hear comments from our Harriet bloggers and readers on Ben Ehrenreich’s “The Long Goodbye,” his epic, beautifully written piece on the work and life of the late Frank Stanford, up now on the Foundation site.
Traveling from Stanford’s Arkansas haunts to Yale’s rare-book library, Ehrenreich carves out a gripping story: of Stanford’s formative years (“The beginning was a hole,” E. writes) and obsession with death, the hard-to-find oeuvre and the massive The Battlefield Where the Moon Says I Love You (“like the lost text of some esoteric faith”), his suicide and his lingering myth.
(The PF archive now has a meaty selection of Stanford poems, so you can experience them firsthand.)
Posted in Uncategorized on Monday, January 21st, 2008 by Ed Park.
Comments (2)
I posted a comment at the end of the article. Speaking of haunts, I’ve been haunted by this piece ever since I read it. I’ve not read such a well researched, deeply felt, painfully smart article–in such gorgeous language to boot–about a poet in a long time. I already cared about this poet, and can’t say thanks enough for featuring this article. The writing is so careful and thorough and exquisite, and makes me want to seek out not only more of Stanford’s work, but Ehrenreich’s novels as well. Thanks Ben, Thanks PF.
Thanks for pointing out this terrific article. I also commented on it.