Product Description

Poetry, fiction, drama, essays, and interviews by George Hitchcock, a major American writer/editor of the 20th century.

Foreword by Philip Levine.

George Hitchcock was the outspoken editor/dictator of kayak, a literary magazine and press that introduced and influenced two generations of American writers and was, as Philip Levine notes in his Foreword, ?ransacked with feverish anticipation.?

Hitchcock is himself an accomplished writer, and One-Man Boat: The George Hitchcock Reader is an eclectic and lively anthology celebrating his colorful oeuvre?surreal, political, and found poems; provocative plays and short stories; candid interviews, reviews, and essays; and his (in)famous (and comically subversive) testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee, reprinted from the Congressional Record. (?That is a delightful question. Am I directed to answer it??)

Introduced by Philip Levine; illustrated by Hitchcock?s notorious rejection slips; and including an in-the-trenches attack of kayak by Robert Bly (which Hitchcock solicited and published), One-Man Boat is proof positive that a life dedicated to the literary arts can be, in a word, bountiful.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2385328 in Books
• Published on: 2003-01-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 260 pages

From Booklist
From 1964 to 1984, Hitchcock edited kayak, publishing virtually every American poet worth reading at the time, regardless of his or her literary manner. He prefers surrealism for his own poetry, and this book's first section contains 96 pages of American surrealist verse as good as it gets, full of the conviction that everything is alive and meaningfully interactive. Humor sparks this poetry, but not at the expense of serious regard for human relations, including politics. Hitchcock's poems are vivid, vital, and engaging even when they elude precise understanding--like Wallace Stevens', only more common in touch. The two stories and two plays in the book are also funny and smart; indeed, that the plays aren't regularly staged is inexplicable, even if they plainly show kinship to the comedies of Giraudoux and Anouilh, in particular. Interviews with Hitchcock (including his 1957 colloquy with the House Un-American Activities Committee), his assessment of kayak, and some of the magazine's illustrated rejection slips and memorable replies to them fill out a book for every American lit collection. Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review
From 1964 to 1984, Hitchcock edited kayak, publishing virtually every American poet worth reading at the time, regardless of his or her literary manner. He prefers surrealism for his own poetry, and this book's first section contains 96 pages of American surrealist verse as good as it gets, full of the conviction that everything is alive and meaningfully interactive. Humor sparks this poetry, but not at the expense of serious regard for human relations, including politics. Hitchcock's poems are vivid, vital, and engaging even when they elude precise understanding--like Wallace Stevens', only more common in touch. The two stories and two plays in the book are also funny and smart; indeed, that the plays aren't regularly staged is inexplicable, even if they plainly show kinship to the comedies of Giraudoux and Anouilh, in particular. Interviews with Hitchcock (including his 1957 colloquy with the House Un-American Activities Committee), his assessment of kayak, and some of the magazine's illustrated rejection slips and memorable replies to them fill out a book for every American lit collection. --Ray Olson, Booklist -- Review

Customer Reviews

Along for the Ride: Some Thoughts on "One-Man Boat"
If you have seen the silent film, Nanook of the North, you might recall that moment when the protagonist arrives in his splendid kayak (also the name of George Hitchcock's near legendary literary journal from 1964-1984), he gets out of the boat and then, from within the boat emerge his wife, two or three children and possibly a husky or two -- on that my memory is not clear. And Story Line Press' masterful collection (edited by Robert McDowell, Joseph Bednarik, & Mark Jarmon, with introduction by Phil Levine, "One-Man Boat: The George Hitchcock Reader" accomplishes a similar effect -- out of this collection emerges George the poet, the playright, the actor, the editor, the novelist, the short story stylist, the witness before the HUAC, and on the cover, George, the painter. This selection from a significant body of work should serve as ample introduction to the work of a man, extraordinary by anyone's standards. This collection stands as testimony to a life lived in dedication to ideas about art and the full expression of art as a daily enterprise rather than some caged rarefied entity. I would hope this book becomes required reading for any serious student of late 20th century literature from the West Coast. I'll close with a paraphrase of one of my favorite poems, "Lying Now in the New Grass" -- the poem is an invocation of rest -- it is sensual and surreal. In its final image the "plow of night" passes over the world. I can think of no other way to spend a restful afternoon/early evening than to sit quietly with the magic of this book, a cup or glass of a favorite beverage, resting in the kayak of this book, with the capable hands of a master at the oars, be he Nanook, be he George -- don't let anyone fool you, it only looks like a one man boat -- it is filled with multitudes.