BI. Amy Lowell

28. Schwartz, William Leonard. ‘A Study of Amy Lowell’s Far Eastern Verse’. Modern Language Notes 43 (1928): 145-52.

Insightful analysis of Lowell’s use of Japanese and Chinese materials. Schwartz is particularly keen in noting Japan-related sources for particular poems and passages, including lines from Edmond de Goncourt’s studies of Utamaro and Hokusai (Ap) that Lowell translated and adopted word for word but did not acknowledge (see D7). Finds finally that ‘if we ever graft Far Eastern branches upon the stock of English poetry, we will turn back to Amy Lowell’s Oriental verse with the gratitude and respect due an inspired explorer’. Incorporates notes about Lowell from Schwartz’s earlier ‘L’Appel de l’extrème-Orient dans la poèsie des ètats-Unis’ (A18).