Galway Kinnell is one of the key voices of a rich generation of American poets--those who were born in the 1920s and gained critical recognition in the 1960s. In some ways representative of that group, Kinnell strikes his own extraordinary chord--a union of sensuous detail, rich music, vulnerable passion, personal experience felt through to mythic layers, and a long and brooding meditation on time and morality.

This book gathers the best and most representative writing on Kinnell. The material ranges from the caustic to the celebratory; from a chronicle of reviews to essays that describe the shape of a career and a vision; from analyses of individual poems to a reminiscence of the friendship between Kinnell and fellow poet James Wright; from early notices of his first book to several new essays written especially for this volume. What emerges is a full, many-faceted, many-toned consideration of the poet and his work.

Contributors include Harold Bloom, Louise Bogan, Joseph Bruchac, James Dickey, Tess Gallagher, Donald Hall, and William Matthews.