Robert Lowell and the Confessional Voice returns to the poet’s early works, such as Land of Unlikeness and Lord Weary’s Castle, in search of a relationship between Lowell’s early poetry and his turn to a confessional style of writing in the 1950s. Lowell’s early poetry is often overshadowed by the emergence of his confessional poetry (that develops in Life Studies; however, instead of Lowell’s early poetry being eclipsed by Life Studies, a remembrance of his early poetry is necessary as a way of understanding Lowell’s evolution as a poet. The early poetry provides readers and scholars of Lowell with a Puritan paradigm and the ethos of an American narrative that Lowell never fully abandons but only perpetually deconstructs.

I remember the first time I saw or should I say became aware of him. My walk from Pt Authority was determined by how many homeless I saw. While I was getting my coffee and bagel from my guy on the street who sold breakfast every morning no matter the weather; I looked over to my left at the crowd in the park and saw him. He had a few people around him talking, smiling and just mesmerized by him. He looked at me and our eyes met, for on a few seconds and then he turned back to those who were hanging on his every word. It felt like a lifetime; his eyes went through me into my soul, if only for a moment. I went about my morning giving the morning events only a fleeting thought; but somehow, I was changed; somehow, I saw something I did not know what and maybe never really understand.

Robert Lowell and the Confessional Voice returns to the poet’s early works, such as Land of Unlikeness and Lord Weary’s Castle, in search of a relationship between Lowell’s early poetry and his turn to a confessional style of writing in the 1950s. Lowell’s early poetry is often overshadowed by the emergence of his confessional poetry (that develops in Life Studies; however, instead of Lowell’s early poetry being eclipsed by Life Studies, a remembrance of his early poetry is necessary as a way of understanding Lowell’s evolution as a poet. The early poetry provides readers and scholars of Lowell with a Puritan paradigm and the ethos of an American narrative that Lowell never fully abandons but only perpetually deconstructs.

I remember the first time I saw or should I say became aware of him. My walk from Pt Authority was determined by how many homeless I saw. While I was getting my coffee and bagel from my guy on the street who sold breakfast every morning no matter the weather; I looked over to my left at the crowd in the park and saw him. He had a few people around him talking, smiling and just mesmerized by him. He looked at me and our eyes met, for on a few seconds and then he turned back to those who were hanging on his every word. It felt like a lifetime; his eyes went through me into my soul, if only for a moment. I went about my morning giving the morning events only a fleeting thought; but somehow, I was changed; somehow, I saw something I did not know what and maybe never really understand.