The work of Basil Bunting refutes the longheld contention that modernism is an exclusively American phenomenon which began on British soil. Integrally connected with Ezra Pound, this movement in poetry began in England in 1908. Not only does the form...

Peter Makin, editor Basil Bunting on Poetry. Johns Hopkins University Press 232 pages, $42 From an American vantage point, it may seem as if the Northumbrian poet Basil Bunting by rights ought to round out a raffish group portrait alongside Welshman David...

Basil Bunting on Poetry, ed. Peter Makin. Johns Hopkins University Press, 232 pp., $42.00. Bunting was an associate of Ezra Pound and others of the Modernist movement. This collection of lectures is a sustained testament to their tenets. Primarily, Bunting argues for the...

While not having the significance and originality of musical sound and structure in his poetry, Bunting's use of image and symbol is an important aspect of his work and worth considering in its own right. In his mature work he employs a post-"Symboliste" technique to striking effect. Also, one never loses sight of the idea of music, for Bunting's most highly developed symbolism has an analogy with this form of art. (p. 82) Particularly noteworthy in Bunting's pictorial ima...

Bunting's poetry [deals] in the structure of meanings and, moreover, the meanings are organised according to a musical architecture—that of sonata form…. For some years Bunting sought the kind of musical structure he required for his poetry, but he must have fixed his choice very early on the sonata, rather than on the more impressionistic prelude, for example. His first published long poem, Villon (1925), is based on simple sonata form, although he had embarked on more complicated vari...

One has in the past done one's darndest to persuade oneself that Bunting does not really mean what he says when he argues, if it can be called argument, that poetry is pure sound. (p. 56) The analogy of poetry with music is a dangerous one for two basic reasons: first, poetry has severe limits in pitch, key, tone, and range; nor can it orchestrate; second, it does not have notes devoid of referrents as music largely does. Words mean—if the poet discards their meaning the hearing mind puts them...