{"product_id":"the-life-and-poetry-of-frank-stanford-paperback","title":"The Life and Poetry of Frank Stanford - Paperback","description":"\u003cdiv\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: right;\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/reportcopyrightinfringement.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\"\u003e\u003cb\u003eReport copyright infringement\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\u003cp\u003eby \u003cb\u003eJames McWilliams\u003c\/b\u003e (Author)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"The full-throated biography fans have been yearning for.\" \u003cbr\u003e --\u003ci\u003eKirkus\u003c\/i\u003e Starred Review, April 2025\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e When twenty-nine-year-old Frank Stanford put three bullets in his chest on June 3, 1978, he ended a life that had been inextricably linked with poetry since childhood. Deeply influential but largely unknown outside his corner of the poetry world, this prodigy of the American South inspired a cult following that has kept his reputation and work flickering on the periphery of the American literary tradition ever since. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Life and Poetry of Frank Stanford\u003c\/i\u003e offers for the first time a comprehensive study of Stanford's life and work, introducing to a broad readership poetry that remains both captivating to poets and, in its celebration of everyday experience over academic erudition, accessible to those who rarely read poetry. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Stanford's poems range from one line to his 15,283-line epic, \u003ci\u003eThe Battlefield Where the Moon Says I Love You\u003c\/i\u003e. The vital thread running through all of his poetry is an ear for language that vies with Walt Whitman in its expansiveness and generosity. Stanford's omnivorous attraction to vernacular, particularly Black and rural vernacular, centered on an admiration for the marginalized and eccentric. Blending the Southern Gothic of Faulkner and O'Connor with a racially egalitarian vision, his poetry thrives on the stories and traditions of the oppressed and forgotten. \u003cbr\u003e ​ \u003cbr\u003e The themes that preoccupied Stanford's prolific output--language, sex, death, class, geography, commercialism, surrealism, film, race--also preoccupied the poet in his daily life, which was marked by heavy drinking, philandering, mental instability, emotional abuse, and, through it all, an inveterate desire for beauty. Constantly attentive to this tension, biographer James McWilliams traces the short and painfully complicated life of this hidden talent who left a lifetime's worth of poetry that, through its grounding in the mundane, achieved a vision of the transcendent. \u003cbr\u003e\u003ch3\u003eAuthor Biography\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003eJames McWilliams is a writer and historian who teaches at Texas State University. His work has appeared in \u003ci\u003eOxford American\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eVirginia Quarterly Review\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eThe New York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eThe American Scholar\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eMississippi Review\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eNumber of Pages:\u003c\/strong\u003e 652\u003c\/div\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003ePublication Date:\u003c\/strong\u003e June 17, 2025\u003c\/div\u003e\n            ","brand":"BooksCloud","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51987387416877,"sku":"9781682262795","price":28.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0938\/3185\/6429\/files\/Fg0iD0jhMR9781682262795.webp?v=1776178416","url":"https:\/\/ishookbooks.com\/products\/the-life-and-poetry-of-frank-stanford-paperback","provider":"iShook Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}