Cities of Saviors: Urban Space in E. E. Cummings’ Complete Poems, 1904–1962, and Peter Ackroyd’s Hawksmoor

Description

Cities of Saviors is a short study of the urban spaces of E. E. Cummings' poetry and Peter Ackroyd's seminal novel, Hawksmoor. Although at first sight a comparison of these two authors might seem surprising, the analysis offered by this new book shows that such a reading can be revelatory for the understanding of both authors. Relying on close readings informed by the spatial theories of Mircea Eliade, Michel Foucault and Gaston Bachelard, it sheds light on a common understanding of space: one that is immersed in a dark sacrality. By doing so, it also radically reinterprets the oeuvre of both authors, in that it positions Cummings away from the accepted image of the neo-Romantic poet of transcendence and situates Ackroyd in the continuing tradition of (late) Modernism. Acknowledgement - i 1. The Sacred City with a Twist: An Introduction - 1 2.1. E. E. Cummings and Urban Space: The Reception - 5 2.2. The Nature of Urban Space in E. E. Cummings' Poetry - 9 2.2.1. The City as Savior vs the Zen Axiom - 13 2.2.2. The City in Selected Poems of the Author's Later Volumes - 17 2.3. From a Bird's Eye View towards the Temples: Specific Heterotopic Localities of E. E. Cummings' New York City - 29 2.4. Mapping the Space of the City: Cartographic and Sacred Fictional Space - 38 2.5. Faces in the Crowd: The Space of the City's Inhabitants - 42 3.1. Peter Ackroyd's London: The Reception - 50 3.2. Hawksmoor: The London of the Architect - 58 3.3. The Existing Critical Interpretation of Hawksmoor's Urban Spaces - 62 3.3.1. A Criticism of the City as Abject Female Body - 65 3.4. The Cartographic Fictional Space of Hawksmoor - 82 3.5. Sacred Heterotopias: An Alternative Reading of the Urban Sphere of Hawksmoor - 97 4. The Urban Space of E. E. Cummings' Poetry and Peter Ackroyd's Fiction: A Comparison - 117 5. Conclusion - 131 Works Cited - 135 Appendix 1: A List of Cummings' Words Presumably Used in an Urban Context - 142 Appendix 2: A Revised List of Cummings' Words Used in an Urban Context - 145 Appendix 3: A Preliminary List of Cummings' Urban Poems - 148 Appendix 4: A Final List of Cummings' Urban Poems - 152