Berryman, John

New York. 1999. Farrar Straus Giroux. 1st Edition. Very Good in Dustjacket. 0374112053. Edited By John Haffenden. 396 pages. hardcover. Jacket Illustration of William Shakespeare courtesy of Fotomas Index U.K. Front Jacket Photograph of John Berryman by Bob Peterson. Jacket Design by Sara Eisenman. Back Jacket Photograph of John Berryman by Jerry Bauer. �. keywords: Shakespeare Literary Criticism America. FROM THE PUBLISHER - John Berryman, one of America's most talented modern poets, was winner of the Pulitzer Prize for 77 Dream Songs and the National Book Award for His Toy, His Dream, His Rest. He gained a reputation as an innovator whose bold literary adventures were tempered by exacting discipline. Berryman was also an active. prolific, and perceptive critic whose own experience as a major poet served to his advantage. In an admiring review of Berryman's collection The Freedom of the Poet, Donald Davie wrote in The New York Times Book Review that he was ‘not only one of the most gifted Americans of his time, but also one of the most honorable and responsible.' Berryman was a protEgE of Mark Van Doren, the great Shakespearean scholar, and the Bard's work remained one of his most abiding passions - he would devote a lifetime to writing about it. His voluminous writings on the subject have now been collected and edited by John Haffenden. This book shows that Berryman's interest in Shakespeare was that of an expert scholar who thought seriously and deeply about his subject. After the opening essay on Shakespeare's early dramatic years, the book continues with Berryman's brilliant reconstruction, ‘Shakespeare at Thirty,' and seven other essays, including ‘The Tragic Substance and ‘Shakespeare's Last Word' (in The Tempest). A whole section is devoted to King Lear, to the textual differences between the quarto and folio editions of this masterpiece, and to Berryman's exchange of letters about the play's problems with another great Shakespearean scholar, W. W. Greg. A fourth section investigates the possibility of William Haughton as the ‘Mr. W.H.' of the sonnets and as a collaborator on The Taming of the Shrew. After a group of essays on various plays, including Henry VI and Macbeth, the book concludes with ‘Shakespeare's Reality,' with which Berryman apparently intended to end his unfinished full-length study of Shakespeare. inventory #26473 ISBN: 0374112053.