Flash player not available.
Click on the covers for more information on the different editions, including their availability.
If you cannot view the image, download the most recent version of Flash Player
by William H. Pritchard?
In an as yet unwritten essay on contemporary American poets I plan to discuss their increasingly vivid use of fundamental imagery, as in Richard Brautigan's new volume:
He'd sell a rat's asshole
to a blindman for a wedding
ring.
to a blindman for a wedding
ring.
or in the title poem
Rommel is dead.
His army has joined the quicksand legions
of history where battle is always
a metal echo saluting a rusty shadow.
His tanks are gone.
How's your ass?
His army has joined the quicksand legions
of history where battle is always
a metal echo saluting a rusty shadow.
His tanks are gone.
How's your ass?
There is also a shorter one from which sprang the Women's Liberation Movement:
She tries to get things out of men
that she can't get because she's not
15% prettier.
that she can't get because she's not
15% prettier.
Brautigan has already attained mythical status so must be something more than what used to be called a wise guy, but he's at least that, and a clever one. Although his final poem, an apostrophe to "Beautiful high-grade fucking" puts forth a lyric value evidently not subject to satiric contemplation.
The Hudson Review
Autumn 1970
Copyright note: My purpose in putting this material on the web is to provide Brautigan scholars and fans with ideas for further research into Richard Brautigan's work. It is used here in accordance with fair use guidelines. No attempt is made regarding commercial duplication and/or dissemination. If you are the author of this article or hold the copyright and would like me to remove your article from the Brautigan Archives, please contact me at birgit at cybernetic-meadows.net.
![[toggle]](javascript:icntoggle('mod-Brautigan_Resourcesl2','module.png'); "[toggle]"){kind=small}