LOVE & FAME

First edition. 8vo, publisher?s original black cloth lettered on the spine in gilt, with the original dustjacket. 96pp. A fine copy in a dustjacket with just the lightest of age mellowing.

Edizione: ?one of the most astonishing things about this astonishing book is that it follows so closely in time the enormous achievement of the author's ?dream songs?, the first part of which, 77 dream songs, won the pulitzer prize for poetry in 1965 and the second part, his toys, his dreams, his rest, the national book award for poetry in 1969.<br> love & fame is written in a style new for berryman, new for anybody. the poet talks of his beginnings as an artist, of his loves; of the strange experience of fame ("dawdling into glory"); of violent politics; of a sanitarium in the midwest ("hospital racket, nurses' iron smiles" ); of the whole peculiar business of being and staying alive. the poems are cast in language that is fresh, frank, blunt, exuberantly gay, shocking, funny, deeply tragic, and never less than memorable:<br> love & fame culminates in a grave series of ?eleven addresses to the lord.?