Research Catalog

Title

The book of Ephraim / James Merrill ; introduced and annotated by Stephen Yenser.

Author

Merrill, James, 1926-1995

Publication

• New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 2018.
• ©2018

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Additional Authors

Yenser, Stephen

Description

203 pages; 22 cm

Summary

"For the first time in a stand-alone edition, the acclaimed poet's classic poem about his communication with Ephraim, a guiding spirit in the Other World, is here introduced and annotated by poet and Merrill scholar Stephen Yenser. "The Book of Ephraim," which first appeared as the final poem in James Merrill's Pulitzer-winning volume Divine Comedies (1976), tells the story of how he and his partner David Jackson (JM and DJ as they came to be known) embarked on their experiments with the Ouija board and how they conversed after a fashion with great writers and thinkers of the past, especially in regard to the state of the increasingly imperiled planet Earth. One of the most ambitious long poems in English in the twentieth century, originally conceived as complete in itself, it was to become the first part of Merrill's epic The Changing Light at Sandover (1982), the multiple prize-winning volume still in print. Merrill's "supreme tribute to the web of the world and the convergence of means and meanings everywhere within it" is introduced and annotated by one of his literary executors, Stephen Yenser, in a volume that will gratify veteran readers and entice new ones"--

Uniform Title

Poems. Selections

Alternative Title

Poems.

Subject

• Merrill, James, 1926-1995 > Criticism and interpretation
• Ouija boards > Poetry
• Spiritualism > Poetry

Genre/Form

Narrative poetry.

Note

• "This is a Borzoi book"--Title page verso.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references.

Contents

Introduction -- The book of Ephraim -- Commentary on the poem.

Call Number

JFD 18-2230

ISBN

• 9781524711344
• 1524711349

LCCN

2017031528

OCLC

993642099

Author

Merrill, James, 1926-1995, author.

Title

The book of Ephraim / James Merrill ; introduced and annotated by Stephen Yenser.

Publisher

New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 2018.

Copyright Date

©2018

Edition

First edition.

Type of Content

text

Type of Medium

unmediated

Type of Carrier

volume

Bibliography

Includes bibliographical references.

Added Author

Yenser, Stephen, editor, writer of introduction.

Yenser, Stephen, inscriber. DLC

Other Form:

Online version: Merrill, James, 1926-1995. Book of Ephraim. First edition. New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 2018 9780525520245 (DLC) 2017041646

Research Call Number

JFD 18-2230