James Dickey

Deliverance

An American tail gunner parachutes from his burning airplane into Tokyo near the close of World War II and begins a harrowing odyssey culminating in a violent test of manhood

To the White Sea

The Early Motion

Poems deal with love, death, nature, travel, childhood, the nature of poetry, alienation, sickness, and hope

Poems, 1968-1979

The Central Motion

A collection of poetry and prose explores American society, the nature of literature, and the author's personal experiences

Poems, Essays, Conversations, Commencements, and Afterwords

Night Hurdling

Dickey critically examines seventy contemporary poets including Randall Jarrell, Howard Nemerov, Rolfe Humphries, May Sarton, E. E. Cummings, Nikos Kazantzakis, and Marianne Moore

Poets & Poetry Now

Babel to Byzantium

James Dickey Poems 1957-1967

Direct and dramatic poems point out the contrasts and agonies of this amoral age

Poems

Buckdancer's Choice

During the Second World War, Frank Cahill, recently blinded, is compelled to learn about his son's mysterious demise and enigmatic life

Alnilam

James Dickey's creativity as a poet is well known. But there have been few opportunities for his readers to become familiar with the full dimensions of his mind, with the thoughts and perceptions that lie just outside the matter of his poetry. Sorties brings together the contents of a journal kept by Dickey for several years and six discerning essays on poetry and the creative process. The journal follows Dickey's mind as it alights on a wide array of topics, ranging from the work of his colleagues to the plotting of a new novel, from the onset of old age to pride over accomplishments in archery and guitar playing. Dickey can be blunt in his opinions, as when he states that "a second-rate writer like Norman Mailer will sit around wondering what on earth it is that Hemingway had that Mailer might possibly be able to get." But the journal also reveals a great capacity for sympathy, as when Dickey tells of his father's long illness, and a revealing candor--"I am Lewis," he writes of his novel Deliverance, "every word is true." The journal is at its most revealing, however, when Dickey discusses the craft of poetry. "It is good for a poet to remember," he writes, "that the human mind, though in some ways very complicated, is in some others very simple." This awareness that poetry must understand the simplicities of human existence is a recurring concern for Dickey, and he writes with disdain of the "brilliant things" that too often clog poetry, the stale self-absorption that warps the perceptions of many poets. In the essays that make up the second part of the book, Dickey also focuses on poetry, exploring the relation of the poet to his works, the promise of a younger generation of poets, and the place of Theodore Roethke as the greatest American poet. Wide-ranging and acute, Sorties opens up for the reader the discriminating mind that lies behind some of the most accomplished and memorable poetry written in America in this century.

Journals and New Essays

Sorties

The Owl King

Works by the controversial poet express his thoughts on such subjects as women, animals, and morality.

The Selected Poems

Presents the tale of an American pilot shot down during the firebombing raid on Tokyo near the end of World War II, whose escape becomes a violent journey of self-exploration

Hubert Shuptrine

Jericho

Hendrik Marsman

The Zodiac

Jeffrey Meyers

Stephen Crane

A classic story of the Civil War follows one soldier's transformation from recruit to survivor and is accompanied by four additional tales, including "The Upturned Face" and "The Blue Hotel."

The Red Badge of Courage and Four Stories

A child hunts the animals of the world with a pop gun and the snare of his imagination.

Tucky the Hunter

"In The One Voice of James Dickey, Gordon Van Ness skillfully documents James Dickey's growth from a callow teen interested primarily in sports to a mature poet who possessed literary genius and who deliberately advanced himself and his career. The letters from 1942 through 1969 depict Dickey gradually establishing a self-identity, deciding to write, struggling to determine a subject matter and style, working determinedly to gain initial recognition, and eventually seeking out the literary establishment to promote himself and his views on poetry. The letters also portray a complex personality with broad interests, acute intelligence, and heightened imagination as well as a deep need to re-create his past and assume various roles in the present." "From Dickey's extensive correspondence, Van Ness has selected not only those letters that best reveal the chronological development of Dickey's career and his conscious efforts to chart its course, but also those that portray his other interests and depict the various features of his personality. The letters are grouped by decade, with each period placed in perspective by a critical introduction. The introductory sections offer a psychological understanding of Dickey's personality by identifying the needs and fears that affected his actions. They also explain the American literary and cultural scene that Dickey confronted as he matured. Together, the letters and commentary yield a sense of Dickey's complex personality - both the man as a writer and the writer as a man - while arguing that he remained "one voice."" "Because how a writer writes - the appearance of a writer's words on a page - makes a statement, the letters are reproduced here without alterations. There are no silent deletions or revisions; the original spelling and punctuation have been preserved. Dickey's letters gathered in The One Voice of James Dickey portray a poet's consciousness, chronicling its growth and revealing its breadth. They do not contain the whole truth, but they are what we have."--Jacket.

His Letters and Life, 1942-1969

The One Voice of James Dickey

William A. Bake

The author reveals the paradise of the Southern mountains through the monologue of an old mountain man; colorful photographs display the beauty and wonder of this remote area

James Dickey

About

Books

Join the club