[The Song of Three Friends] has not hitherto been reviewed in Poetry, because it seemed unnecessary to repeat criticisms fully suggested, in February, 1916, in a notice of The Song of Hugh Glass, the first poem published of its author's projected epic series, though the second in artistic order. But the recent P.S.A. award to this book, as one of the two best American books of verse of 1919 … seems to call for a more complete statement of our exceptions to the committee's verdict, our reasons for thinking this poem "fundamentally unsound as a work of art."

The reasons are essentially one—the discord between the story and the style. The poet's project—a series of narratives presenting that most romantic period of American history, the winning of the West by adventurous wanderers and traders—is an heroic adventure itself, and not more deliberate a literary plan, perhaps...