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This 56-minute look at the life and work of New England poet Robert Lowell begins with him reading from one of his anxiety-driven poems and then confessing to lifting one of its choice phrases from the lips of his 5-year-old daughter. This same combination of bleakness and humanity plagued him throughout his 60 years and inspired such classic works as "The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket." Fellow poets, his editor Robert Giroux, and writer Elizabeth Hardwick (his second ex-wife and mother of his children) discuss his work and the motivations and experiences behind it. From his prison sentence for conscientious objection to serving in World War II to his brief conversion to Catholicism to his stays in mental hospitals, Lowell turned his life into his work, becoming one of the innovators of confessional or autobiographical poetry. Interspersed with the interviews are vintage audiotapes of Lowell reading excerpts from his work, with illustrative footage.
--Kimberly Heinrichs
From the Back Cover
Grappling with such concerns as cultural decline, racial injustice and nuclear war, Robert Lowell (1917-1977) was rooted in the past but fully engages with the present. The film examines Lowell's use of autobiography and historical events and reveals his deep psychological and spiritual anguish. The poet is interviewed and reads form his work. Commentators include Robert Giroux, Robert Hass, and Elizabeth Hardwick.
