Melville House Books

The current issue of The Chicago Review, entitled American Heretic, features a 250-page section dedicated to the life and work of the late Black Mountain poet Edward Dorn. The editors of the Chicago Review, who have been at work on the issue since Dorn’s death in 1999, note that their intention is not to reintroduce the poet, but rather to “confirm Dorn’s location on the map,” to demonstrate “the kind of care and interest that persists for Dorn’s work.” The issue includes late poems by Dorn, selections from his letters, a transcript of a 1977 poetry workshop he organized, and critical reviews about the new material. Dorn, whose work was first widely circulated in Donald Allen’s classic 1960 anthology New American Poetry, is the author of more than twenty books of poetry, including The North Atlantic Turbine and the Gunslinger series.

Dennis Johnson is the founder of MobyLives, and the co-founder and co-publisher of Melville House.