The Poetic Front

Abstract

This introductory chapter examines how the historical and economic crisis of the Great Depression coincided with a complementary crisis in the literary. It argues that the 1930s is a crucible for understanding both the history of modern American poetics and the role of poetic thought in conceptualizing historical change. The introduction surveys important historical aspects of the left poetry community during the interwar period, and it outlines the book’s interventions in contemporary poetry scholarship as well as in studies of left literary culture.