A New Plèiade is a celebration of close literary friendships among seven eminent American poets—Fred Chappell, Kelly Cherry, R. H. W. Dillard, Brendan Galvin, George Garrett, David R. Slavitt, and Henry Taylor. The affection, fun, and mutual respect of this happy association of poets have resulted in this anthology, in which the selection from the work of each was made by the contributor whose name precedes his or hers alphabetically.
Endowed with great variety as well as delightful and unexpected connections of subjects and personae, A New Plèiade is exceptional not only because it unites in a single volume these seven accomplished poets: the real allure of this enchanting, broadly appealing collection is the diversity, the vast scope of their masterful voices. The bucolic musings of Fred Chappell greet the reader, followed by the searching, graceful lamentations of Kelly Cherry, the unconventional observations of R.H.W. Dillard, and the eccentric creations of Brendan Galvin. George Garrett’s precise, shining insights precede David R. Slavitt’s erudite, witty contemplations until, alas, Henry Taylor bids farewell by bringing us full circle, back to a pastoral world reminiscent of Chappell’s rural samplings.
These poets have been delighting and entertaining one another—and their loyal readers—for decades. With A New Plèiade, these seven illustrious bards—and good friends—are able to settle comfortably between the covers of one extraordinary book.
Fred Chappell is the author of more than thirty volumes of poetry and prose. He has received the Bollingen Prize, the T. S. Eliot Award, and the Thomas Wolfe Prize. His fiction has been translated into more than a dozen languages and received the Best Foreign Book Award from the Académie Française. He was the poet laureate of North Carolina from 1997 to 2002.
Kelly Cherry is the author of over twenty-five books of fiction, poetry, and nonfiction, including The Life and Death of Poetry and Quartet for J. Robert Oppenheimer. She is Eudora Welty Professor Emerita of English and Evjue-Bascom Professor Emerita in the Humanities at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. She and her husband live in Virginia.
R. H. W. Dillard is the author of five previous poetry volumes, including Just Here, Just Now; two novels; a story collection; and two critical studies. He has also published verse translations of plays by Plautus and Aristophanes. Professor of English and head of the creative writing program at Hollins University in Virginia, he is a recipient of the O. B. Hardison, Jr., Poetry Prize, awarded by the Folger Shakespeare Library.
Brendan Galvin is the author of eighteen poetry collections, including Habitat: New and Selected Poems, 1965–2005, a finalist for the National Book Award. His many other honors include a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Sotheby Prize of the Arvon Foundation, the Iowa Poetry Prize, Poetry’s Levinson Prize, and two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts. He lives in Truro, Massachusetts.
George Garrett is the author or editor of more than forty books, including the poetry collection Days of Our Lives Lie in Fragments: New and Old Poems, 1957–1997. He has won numerous awards, among them the Rome Prize of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the T.S. Eliot Award, and the PEN/Malamud Award for Short Fiction. He is Hoyns Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Virginia.
David R. Slavitt has published more than 120 books of poetry, fiction, and translation. Born in White Plains, New York, and educated at Andover, Yale, and Columbia, Slavitt has worked at Newsweek and taught at Temple University, Columbia, the University of Pennsylvania, Princeton, and Bennington College.
Henry Taylor has published eight collections of poems, among them The Flying Change, for which he received the Pulitzer Prize. His other honors include the Michael Braude Award for Light Verse, the Witter Bynner Poetry Prize, the Aiken Taylor Award for Modern American Poetry, and membership in the Fellowship of Southern Writers. He and his wife, fiber artist Mooshe Taylor, live in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Found an Error? Tell us about it.
