Neglected Powers: Essays on Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Literature

Description

Professor Wilson Knight is well known for his interpretative work on Shakespeare, Byron and other classics. He has also from time to time published articles on modern literature. These are here collected, with the addition of new material.Poets who have had little analytic attention in recent years such as Tennyson, Masefield and Brooke, are shown, in the manner to which we have grown accustomed in Wilson Knight's studies, to hold a dimension of meaning hitherto ignored or misunderstood. Homage is paid to John Cowper Powys as one of the foremost seers of our, or any, age. A comprehensive review of the work of Francis Berry claims to establish him as our foremost living poet.Professor Knight's new volume makes an uncompromising challenge. He urges, and goes far to prove, that modern literary criticism has failed to make contact with the richer meanings of contemporary literature. He stresses the relation between such acclaimed poets as Yeats and Eliot and the spiritualistic movements of today, and argues that powers to which our ecclesiastical and academic traditions have been blind are crying for recognition, not only through our leading poets but also in pop music. Professor Knight regards youth-revolts as signs of a healthy dissatisfaction with an irreligious and directionless culture, and believes that our hope lies in the neglected powers pressing for acceptance.