{"product_id":"i-six-nonlectures-the-charles-eliot-norton-lectures","title":"i: six nonlectures (The Charles Eliot Norton Lectures)","description":"“Marvelously unconventional...a credo of intense individualism.”―Atlantic\n\nA brilliantly eccentric autobiography from one of the most widely read poets of the twentieth century.\n\n“Let me cordially warn you, at the opening of these socalled lectures, that I haven’t the remotest intention of posing as a lecturer.” So begins the first of six delightfully off-kilter “nonlectures” delivered at Harvard in 1952–1953. Gleefully flouting the conventions of the prestigious Charles Eliot Norton Professorship in Poetry, which had previously hosted T. S. Eliot, Igor Stravinsky, and other luminaries, E. E. Cummings declines to offer anything in the way of critical analysis, citing Rainer Maria Rilke’s contention that “Works of art are of an infinite loneliness and with nothing to be so little reached as with criticism.”\n\nInstead, six nonlectures presents a kaleidoscopic tour of the great poet’s life, influences, and favorite poems, from Chaucer, Wordsworth, and Swinburne to selections of his own work. After an autobiographical sketch of his youth in Cambridge, Massachusetts―including reflections on his father’s tragic death, accounts of his formative relationships with the pragmatist philosophers William James and Josiah Royce, stories from his days as a Harvard undergraduate, and readings of his earliest attempts at poetry―Cummings captivates with stream-of-consciousness musings on a dizzying array of subjects: freedom and democracy, New York and Paris, Lenin’s tomb and high-speed elevators, death and Santa Claus.\n\nReplete with digressions, irreverent wordplay, and, of course, parentheses, six nonlectures is a moving tribute to the spirit of artistic individuality, that dedication to unmitigated personal truth without which the poet “would cease to exist at all.”\u003cbr\u003eASIN: 0674440102\u003cbr\u003eVSKU: BVV.0674440102.A\u003cbr\u003eCondition: Acceptable\u003cbr\u003eAuthor\/Artist:cummings, e. e. [Edward Estlin]\u003cbr\u003eBinding: Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eNote:\u003c\/b\u003e Any images shown are stock photographs and product may differ from what is shown.  \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eCondition Notes\u003c\/b\u003e: The item is very worn but is perfectly usable. Signs of wear can include aesthetic issues such as scratches, dents, worn and creased covers, folded page corners and minor liquid stains. All pages and the cover are intact, but the dust cover may be missing. Pages may include moderate to heavy amount of notes and highlighting, but the text is not obscured or unreadable. Page edges may have foxing  age related spots and browning . May NOT include discs, access code or other supplemental materials.  \u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Blue Vase Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44302141489213,"sku":"BVV.0674440102.A","price":6.76,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0589\/4225\/9261\/files\/0674440102-0.jpg?v=1793742083","url":"https:\/\/www.bluevasebooks.com\/products\/i-six-nonlectures-the-charles-eliot-norton-lectures","provider":"Blue Vase Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}