Managing The Manager: Critical Essays on Richard Berengarten’s Book-length Poem

Poet Richard Berengarten has published over 25 books including poetry, translations and criticism since his first collection, The Easter Rising, appeared in 1968. His poetry has been translated into more than 90 languages. His book-length poem The Manager was first published in 2001. This original and innovative work received high praise from reviewers at the time and has since then seen two more editions in 2008 and 2011 with various revisions by the author. His complex, entertaining book engages with issues such as the Modernist heritage, Postmodernist experimentation, gender relations and the problem of contemporary spiritual emptiness. Recognized as a seminal work of the late 20th century, this book-length poem employs a little-used poetic form the verset or verse paragraph. This volume brings together original essays on The Manager by nine internationally-known poets, critics and academics. It is aimed primarily at a scholarly audience-teachers, researchers and students of contemporary poetry written in English. While the essays are specialized, they are at the same time clearly-written and avoid academic jargon. Their argumentative transparence will therefore also make them available to a more general readership interested in contemporary poetry and the broader cultural issues that it entails. This book will serve for many as an introduction to a figure who is arguably one of the most significant poets writing in English today.