SOURCE: "Peter Viereck: Durable Poet," The Massachusetts Review, Vol. IX, No. 3, Summer, 1968, pp. 591-95.

In the following essay, Jacobsen argues for the durability of Viereck's poetry, suggesting that in addition to his technical skills his work reveals a certain universality which she calls a "cosmic sense. "

Though in general it is far from the case, one would think that humility would be an occupational hazard for the critic. The percentage of howlers produced by generally astute critics is history. But not even the widely held belief that Lalla Rookh was the apex of its century's literary offering, chastens the professional descendants of those prophets. Poetic chic flows on, carrying with it a number of fine poets, and all the flotsam of the arriviste and the second rate. Eventually, less precarious judgments are established.

As there are good poets whose especial vein happens to coincide with the current taste...