Cummings, E.E.

E.E. Cummings: Complete Poems 1904-1962 with: Ephemera

ISBN: 0871401452
New York, NY, USA: Liveright, 1991. First Edition Thus. Hardcover. “A thick, foul scattering of grim, grey snow, / Reaching out scrawny limbs, deep digs its nails / Into the bleeding face of suppliant earth, / And grins with all its broken, yellow teeth. / A warm, serene, soft heaven gazes down / With dreamy eyes upon the fiend-cramped world. / The rosy eastern glow, the sun’s I Come, / Patters about the sky, and coos, and smiles— / Sweet babe with tender, rose-begetting feet. / From a black corpse of tree, the hideous rasp / Of staring grackles, clucking and bowing each / In drivelling salute, splits the soft air / To inharmonious fragments; everywhere / A nervous, endless, hoarse, incessant chirp / Of sparrows telling all the evil news. / Ah, God—for the flower-air of Spring! To see / The world in bud! To press with eager feet / The dear, soft, thrilling green again! To be / Once more in touch with heaven upon earth! One soul-toned thrush’s perfect harmony, / One little warbler’s huge felicity, / One buttercup! One perfect butterfly!”--E.E. Cummings, “Semi-Spring,” pg. 907. American poet, painter, essayist, author, and playwright, Edward Estlin Cummings (1894-1962) a/k/a E.E. Cummings is widely considered one of the finest & most important poets of the 20th century. Literally a life-long poet—having started from age 10 writing a poem a day experimenting with form and style—Cummings was an avant-garde, Dadaist who was deeply influenced by Modernist poets like Gertrude Stein (1874-1946) & Ezra Pound (1885-1972); although his work notably drew from more traditional forms as well, like sonnets. Cummings’ corpus is massive, having written roughly 2900 poems in his life, three prose works, and a handful of plays. Cummings’ legacy is as vast as it is influential to virtually every poet that proceeds him. Offered today is the 1991 collection E.E. Cummings: Complete Poems 1904-1962. Edited by George J. Firmage (about whom, unfortunately, little information is available other than he edited many of Cummings’ works), E.E. Cummings: Complete Poems 1904-1962 covers the entirety of the poet's life in verse. From his humble, yet ambitious, beginnings at age 10 to his death in the early 60s, Complete Poems is a massive tome that truly encompasses Cummings’ career as a poet. From inside front flap of dust jacket: “This revised, corrected, and expanded edition of E.E. Cummings’s Complete Poems brings together, for the first time, all of the poems published or designated for publication by the poet in his lifetime, including thirty-six poems that have not previously been available in an American edition. Also included are 164 unpublished poems issued in 1983 under the title Etcetera.” From the collection of Laurence Goldstein (1943-2023), a renowned American poet, film critic, editor & academician here at the University of Michigan. We have found and retained between front cover and first blank page [1] three page article by Paul Muldoon cut out of The New Yorker from March 3, 2014 on Cummings and his poetic works and [2] a little square card that says “With compliments of the publisher”. Hardcover in unclipped dust jacket. First edition thus though not explicated at copyright page, first printing as indicated by number sequence thereon. Book in very fine condition with only minor wear to fine edges. Dust jacket in very fine condition with minor wear to fine edges, slight smudging/scratching to front and back covers, and light discoloration due to age-toning to same. Very Fine / Very Fine. [Item #9015]

Price: $60.00