Bantam in Pine-Woods

"Bantams in Pine-Woods" is a poem from Wallace Stevens's first book of poetry, Harmonium. It was first published in 1922 in the poetry journal Dial, along with five other poems, all under the title "Revue."[1] It is in the public domain.[2]

Bantams in Pine-Woods

 Chieftain Iffucan of Azcan in caftan
 Of tan with henna hackles, halt!

 Damned universal cock, as if the sun
 Was blackamoor to bear your blazing tail.

 Fat! Fat! Fat! Fat! I am the personal.
 Your world is you. I am my world.

 You ten-foot poet among inchlings. Fat!
 Begone! An inchling bristles in these pines,

 Bristles, and points their Appalachian tangs,
 And fears not portly Azcan nor his hoos.

Interpretation

This poem can be read as a declaration of independence for American poetry. The new world's "inchling" poets[3] are defiant towards the traditional literary canon, and particularly defiant against the unnamed, arrogant, self-appointed gatekeeper of literary tradition; they are confident instead in their own free powers of innovation in the New World. The poem can be compared to "The Paltry Nude Starts on a Spring Voyage" on Helen Vendler's interpretation of it as an expression of confidence in new American art. In this reading, Chieftain Iffucan represents the canon, making a claim of universality and a privileged access to inspiration that is challenged by the Appalachian inchlings. The richness of tradition is conceded ("Fat!...."), but it is then relativized ("Your world is you").

Notes
  1. Cook, p. 36
  2. Buttel, p. 194. See also Librivox Archived 2010-10-13 at the Wayback Machine and the Poetry web site."Poetry". Archived from the original on 2008-02-03. Retrieved 2007-02-23.
  3. The word "inchling" is, in fact, a neologism coined by Wallace Stevens for this poem; the poet James Merrill made use of the word in his celebrated 1974 poem "Lost in Translation", in which themes from "Bantams in Pine-Woods" play an important subtext.

References
  • Buttel, Robert. Wallace Stevens: The Making of Harmonium. 1967: Princeton University Press.
  • Vendler, Helen. On Extended Wings. 1969: Harvard University Press.
  • Cook, Eleanor. A Reader's Guide to Wallace Stevens. 2007: Princeton University Press.
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