Staying Open: Charles Olsons Sources and Influences

"Staying Open, Charles Olsons Sources and Influences" investigates the inter-disciplinary influences on the work of the mid-Century American poet, Charles Olson. This edited collection of essays covers Olsons diverse non-literary interests, including his engagement with the music of John Cage and Pierre Boulez, his interests in abstract expressionism, and his readings of philosopher Alfred North Whitehead. The essays also examine Olsons pedagogy, which he developed in the experimental environment at Black Mountain College, as well as his six-month archeological journey through the Yucatan Peninsula in 1950 to explore the culture of the Maya. This book will, therefore, be a strong research aid to scholars working in diverse fields - music, archeology, pedagogy, philosophy, art, and psychology - as it outlines methods for close inter-disciplinary work that can uncover the mechanics of Olsons creative, literary processes.
Building on the straightforward scholarship of George Butterick, whose Guide to the Maximus Poems remains indispensable for readers of Olsons work, the essays in this volume will also guide readers through the thick allusions within The Maximus Poems itself. New interest in the wide-ranging and non-literary nature of Olsons thought in several recent academic works makes this book both timely and necessary. Physics Envy: American Poetry and Science in the Cold War and After by Peter Middleton as well as Contemporary Olson edited by David Herd have started the process of uncovering the extent to which Olsons inter-disciplinary interests inflected his poetic compositions. "Staying Open" extends the preliminary investigations of Olsons non-literary sources in those volumes by bringing together a community of scholars working across disciplines and within a wide variety of humanistic concerns.