A Kind of Order, a Kind of Folly by Stanley Kunitz
"A Kind of Order, a Kind of Folly" is a collection of essays, reviews, and conversations by Stanley Kunitz, reflecting on his intellectual journey as he approached the age of seventy. This work showcases Kunitz's desire to create a structured record of his thoughts and experiences, highlighting his talent for organizing disparate ideas into a cohesive narrative. The collection is noted for its elegant style, which evolved throughout Kunitz's literary career, influenced by his interactions with contemporaries like Robert Lowell and Theodore Roethke.
Kunitz explores themes ranging from the universe to the intricacies of art, emphasizing the interconnectedness of various artistic disciplines. His writings delve into the creative processes of notable poets and artists, offering critical insights without personal bias. The collection is particularly valued for its intellectual depth and Kunitz's ability to weave together critical analysis with biographical elements, making it a significant contribution to literary discourse. Overall, the work exemplifies Kunitz's commitment to understanding and ordering the complexities of human thought and creativity.
A Kind of Order, a Kind of Folly by Stanley Kunitz
Excerpted from an article in Magill’s Survey of American Literature, Revised Edition
First published: 1975
Type of work: Essays
The Work
Perhaps feeling the pressure of having reached the biblically allotted three score and ten years of age, Kunitz felt the need to provide some organized record of his reflections about the world in which he lives. In 1975, still active in literary circles, teaching regularly, and fulfilling his duties as a consultant in poetry to the Library of Congress, he compiled this collection of his essays, reviews, and conversations. What might have been an incoherent whole, a ragtag gathering of past writing, in this instance is a coherent and cohesive presentation of the intellectual growth of a gifted, intelligent artist. As in the collections of his poems, where Kunitz imposes a controlling framework often without regard to chronology, so in this selection of his prose work has he paid careful attention to the overall arrangement of what he offers his readers.
It is important to note this detail, because if there is one consistent thread in Kunitz’s artistic life, it is his concern with ordering information. He has shown himself to be keenly aware of the workings of human intelligence, demonstrating in his critical and biographical writings about such poets as William Blake, John Keats, and William Butler Yeats and of such nonliterary geniuses as Albert Einstein that high levels of imagination do not function in linear, sequential ways. A toss of the intellectual dice leaves ideas scattered and inchoate. It is the work of high intellect to gather disparate snips of information and rearrange them into meaningful form. Such is the task of the highest level of writers and scientists. Knowing facts is not enough; imposing a theoretical framework upon them is what makes them resonate.
This collection has been lauded for the elegance of its style, which, in Kunitz’s case, changed quite drastically after 1960, possibly because of his close association with poets Robert Lowell and Theodore Roethke, two of his closest friends. They helped him understand that the Elizabethan, Jacobean, and Metaphysical conventions that had shaped his early poetry could be relaxed. As Kunitz moved toward freer poetic expression in his verse, so did he loosen somewhat the style of his essays.
This volume begins with a consideration of the universe and ends with Kunitz’s concerns about art, moving sequentially from the physical to the aesthetic and linking the two immutably. He writes, as in “Sister Arts,” about the close connection of all the arts, showing the correlations that exist between painters and wordsmiths.
His appreciative prose portraits of Mark Rothko, Roethke, and Lowell contain shrewd aesthetic judgments, well documented and untinged by personal loyalty. His interview with Lowell remains a major source on that poet. In “The Vice-President of Insurance,” a critique of Wallace Stevens’s letters, and in his essay on John Berryman, Kunitz reveals another side of his critical disposition, firing sharp but wholly decorous salvos at both poets.
Bibliography
Busa, Chris. “Stanley Kunitz: The Art of Poetry XXIX.” The Paris Review 24 (Spring, 1982): 204-246.
A Celebration for Stanley Kunitz: On His Eightieth Birthday. Riverdale-on-the-Hudson, N.Y.: Sheep Meadow Press, 1986.
Hagstrum, Jean H. “The Poetry of Stanley Kunitz: An Introductory Essay.” In Poets in Progress, edited by Edward B. Hungerford. Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University Press, 1967.
Hénault, Marie. Stanley Kunitz. Boston: Twayne, 1980.
Kunitz, Stanley. Interview by Caroline Sutton. Publishers Weekly 228 (December 20, 1985): 67-68.
Kunitz, Stanley. “An Interview with Stanley Kunitz.” Interview by Cynthia Davis. Contemporary Literature 15 (Winter, 1974): 1-14.
Lundquist, Kent. “Stanley Kunitz.” In Encyclopedia of American Literature, edited by Steven R. Serafin. New York: Continuum Press, 1999.
Martin, Harry. “Warren and Kunitz: Poets in the American Grain.” The Washington Post Book World, September 30, 1979, 10.
Orr, Gregory. Stanley Kunitz: An Introduction to the Poetry. New York: Columbia University Press, 1985.
Ostroff, Anthony J., ed. The Contemporary Poet as Artist and Critic. Boston: Little, Brown, 1964.
Shaw, Robert B. “A Book of Changes.” The New York Times Book Review, July 22, 1979, 1, 20.