One Art: Letters of Elizabeth Bishop

About this book

Robert Lowell once remarked "When Elizabeth Bishops letters are published (as they will be) she will be recognized as not only one of the best but one of the most prolific writers of our century." One Art is the magificent confirmation of Lowells prediction. From several thousand letters written by Bishop over fifty yearsfrom 1928 when she was seventeen to the day of her death in Boston in 1979Robert Giroux the poets longtime friend and editor has selected over five hundred missives for this volume. In a way the letters comprise Bishops autobiography and Giroux has greatly enhanced them with his own detailed candid and highly informative introduction. One Art takes us behind Bishops formal sophistication and reserve fully displaying the gift for friendship the striving for perfection and the passionate questing rigorous spirit that made her a great artist.