Jeffers Studies Robert J. Brophy Department of English California State University Long Beach, CA 90840 Demo XPress Quark Jeffers Studies QuarkVolume 6 Number 4 Fall 2002 XPress Jointly Sponsored by Occidental College California State University Long Beach Robinson Jeffers Association Demo Jeffers Studies Volume 6 Number 4 Fall 2002 QuarkCONTENTS News and Notes 1 Publications 3 Contributors 4 Play Review: Medea at Carmel 5 Robert Kafka Two Reviews: Stones of the Sur 7 Lin Moore and George Hart Two Reviews: The Wild God of the World 13 Robert Zaller and Robert Brophy De Rerum Virtute: A Critical Anatomy 22 Steven Chapman The Work of the Edition: Some Possible Lessons and Directions 36 XPressTim Hunt Carrying the Weight: Jefferss Role in Preparing the Way for Ecocriticism 46 Peter Quigley Demo Jeffers Studies (ISSN 1096-5076) is published quarterly by California State University Long Beach, co- sponsoring with Occidental College and the Robinson Jeffers Association. Triquarterly (Winter, Spring, Summer) issues follow a format similar to that of the preceding Robinson Jeffers Newsletter, including news and notes, memoirs, reviews, abstracts, short refereed articles, bibliography, and the Una Jeffers Correspondent series. The final issue each year, a perfect-bound annual, includes up to six longer scholarly articles, each exploring in depth some aspect of Jefferss life, work, or times. After acceptance for publication, these articles will be available in electronic format through Jeffers Studies Online at <www.jeffers.org>, Quarkthe Internet complement to the print journal. Editorial Board: Robert Brophy, Senior Editor; George Hart, Co-Editor; Robert Kafka, Managing Editor; Peter Quigley, World Wide Web Editor. Copy-editing and typesetting: Greg Williams. Advisory Board: Charles Altieri, Albert Gelpi, Dana Gioia, Robert Hass, Mark Jarman, Brenda Jeffers, Lindsay Jeffers, Thomas Lyon, Czeslaw Milosz, Scott Slovic, Gary Snyder, Diane Wakoski. Subscriptions: For individuals, $15 annually; for institutions, $35. Jeffers Studies is included with Robin- son Jeffers Association membership. Annual dues are currently $25 (Regular), $50 (Sustaining), $100 (Patron), $500 (Lifetime). The RJA is a tax-exempt corporation under Section 501 (c) (3) of the IRS tax code; dues, except for that portion ($15) attributable to the subscription to Jeffers Studies, are tax- deductible. RJA membership dues should be sent to Robert Kafka, RJA Treasurer, at the address given below. Back issues of Jeffers Studies are $5 each for regular issues, $10 each for annual and special issues. Back issues of the Robinson Jeffers Newsletter are $4 each. Issues 179 are $175; issues 80100 are $80. Subscriptions and back issues: Robert Kafka, UCLA Extension, Room 214, 10995 Le Conte Ave., Los Ange- les, CA 90024, e-mail <[email protected]>. Submissions and editorial communications: Robert Brophy, Department of English, CSULB, Long Beach, CA 90840, e-mail <[email protected]>. RJA mem- bership applications should be sent to Robert Kafka, RJA Treasurer, at the above address. Articles are Copyright © 2003 by their respective authors. All rights reserved. XPressJeffers Studies is indexed in the MLA International Bibliography. GUIDELINES FOR SUBMISSIONS Shorter manuscripts, suitable for numbers 1, 2, and 3 of each volume, in two double-spaced copies, should typically range up to 4,000 words. Longer essays should be between 5,000 and 9,000 words. Both should be accompanied by a self-addressed stamped postcard for prompt acknowledgment. The authors name should appear on the initial page only. All copies are non-returnable. Citation of Jefferss poetry should be from the Stanford Collected Poetry, abbreviated CP. Until the Collected Letters (Stanford) is available, cita- tion of Robinson and Una Jeffers letters should be from Ann Ridgeways Selected Letters (SL) (Johns Hop- kins) or from the Una Jeffers Correspondent series in issues of the Robinson Jeffers Newsletter (see RJN index, issue 100, Fall 1996). Formatting should follow the MLA Handbook, fourth edition, with paren- thetical citations, endnotes, and works cited. A final revision of an accepted article should be submitted in hard copy and as an IBM-formatted Word file on a 3.5" floppy disk. Demo ness: Big Sur and Jefferss insanities of desire; News and Notes Patrick Dooleys The Inhuman Philosophies of Robinson Jeffers and Edward Abbey: to travel down the strange falling scale; and George Harts RJA CONFERENCE From the Two to the One: Jeffers and Rexroth, Sacramental Wholeness, and the Age of Ecology. The 2:00 panel, titled Rock the House: Whats The Ninth Annual RJA Conference, April 2627, Geology Got to Do with It? ventured ShaunAnne Quark2003, met at the Radisson Woodlands Hotel, Tangneys Writing the Rock: Robinson Jeffers and Flagstaff, sponsored by The Center for Culture and Apocalyptic Geology; Aaron Yoshinobus The Environment, Northern Arizona University. The Geologic Consciousness of Robinson Jeffers: Map- theme was Directions in Environmentalism: Jef- ping the Influence of Geology at Tor House and in fers and Others. The Call for Papers quoted from Verse; and Peter Quigleys The Role of Houses in Max Oelschlaegers proposal that an alternative the Life and Writing of Environmental Writers. idea of wild nature as a source of human existence The late afternoon meeting was a Special Presen- is gaining public hearing, reminding us that tation on Falconry in which Alan Malnar dis- nature must be seen as a continuum, where it is, at cussed Hawks of Jeffers Country: A Biological, one end, little more than a romantic anachronism, Ethological, and Morphological Presentation, and, on the other, a category intrinsically bound up using his own perched hawk illustratively. The with the emergence of an evolutionary viewpoint evenings banquet was introduced with awards and on cosmological process. The call for papers con- tributes and by Frances McAllister as speaker. Sun- cluded: Environmentalism and the study of en- days program began with a plenary address by vironmental literature seem to vacillate around Gary Nabhan, author of The Desert Smells Like Oelschlaegers three points of concern: nature as a Rain and Cultures of Habitat, both Director of source for human existence, nature as a roman- NAUs Center for Sustainable Environments and tic anachronism, and nature as a cosmological NAU Professor of Biology. His subject was The process. Saturday mornings keynote address, by Whole Human Race Spends Too Much Emotion Max Oelschlaeger, author of The Idea of Wilder- on Itself (words from Robinson Jeffers). A 9:30 ness and Caring for Creation, and Frances B. McAl- panel, Intersections of Art and Environment, fea- XPresslister, Chair of Community, Culture, and Envi- tured David Rothmans Ecotopia and Art in the ronment at Northern Arizona University, was titled Twentieth Century; Robert Zallers Landscape as Jefferss Theophanic Spiral: A Strong Poets Love Divination: Reading Apology for Bad Dreams; of God. The 9:30 panel, Who Speaks (for) the and Rebecca Raglons Robinson Jeffers and the Environment, featured Jeff Fouquets Writing to Implications of an Environmental Aesthetic. This Victory: Jeffers, Freirie, and Mustering Soldiers for was followed by a panel, Presentation on the the Ongoing Struggle for Environmental Aware- Importance of the Arts in the Study of the Environ- ness; Catherine Owens Roots of Language: ment, discussed by Diane Thiel and Constantine Robinson Jefferss Ecological Meta-Poesis; and Hadjilambrinos. The concluding afternoon panel, Terry Beerss Robinson Jeffers and Sally Car- Final Considerations, heard Jim Bairds Jeffers righar: Exploring the Inner Life of Animals. The and Hardy: Closet Ecologists and Alex Vardamiss 11:00 panel, Responses to Time and Place, heard Medea and the Imagery of War. Robert Brophys Environment Inducing Mad- Demo News and Notes 1 SHIVA SET TO MUSIC which, Interrogations at Noon, won the 2002 American Book Award. As a provocative critic, he is best known for his 1991 book of essays Can Shiva, a lyric poem by Robinson Jeffers set to Poetry Matter and for Fallen Western Star: The music by graduate student Mark Peterson, was Decline of San Francisco as a Literary Region, performed on Saturday, May 18, at 3:00 p.m. at the (Hungry Mind Review, Winter 19992000), which Daniel Recital Hall on the CSULB campus. The precipitated a collection of pro and con essays composition is scored for chorus, percussion, edited by Jack Foley in 2001. Gioia's translations Quarkwoodwinds, piano, and string bass, and was con- include Italian Nobel Prize-winner Eugenio Mon- ducted by the composer. Peterson, who holds tale's Mottetti (1990), two anthologies of Italian degrees in both English and Music, has long poetry, and Senecas Latin The Madness of Her- admired the poetry of Jeffers. When he was a cules (1995), performed by Verse Theater Manhat- teenager, he visited the Jeffers home in Carmel. tan. With X. J. Kennedy he has edited the very Even then he shared his view that poetry should be popular college textbook Literature: An Introduc- a blending of fire and earth. Peterson chose the tion to Fiction, Poetry and Drama. For the last six Shiva text for its powerful imagery and relevance years he has been classical music critic for San for todays post-9/11 world. Woodwinds declaim Francisco magazine, and he has written the lib- the hawk motif at unpredictable times, while the retto for Nosferatu, an opera, with Alva Henderson peaceful motif of the tubular bells is systematically as composer. His poetry has been featured in a displaced. The chorus, which begins with a medita- dance theater production, Counting the Children. tive incantation of Shiva, gradually builds in inten- He has taught at prestigious universities and is Vice sity with the help of the percussion, which drives President of the Poetry Society of America. Dana the music to a climactic dissonance. The composi- will be recalled as the featured speaker at both RJA tion ends with a final chorus that returns to the lush and THF festivals, championing Robinson Jeffers and tranquil sound of a capella chorus and ends as a major American poet.