Michael McClure

Rod Phillips (Michigan State University)

Ed. by Nick Selby, University of East Anglia
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.4: American (US) Writing and Culture: Postwar and Contemporary, 1945-present.
Vol. editors: Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), Dale Enggass (University of Utah), Christopher Hugh Gair (University of Glasgow), Matthew Hofer (University of New Mexico), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Kerry Myler (Newman University), Justin Parks (UiT - The Arctic University of Norway), Nick Selby (University of East Anglia)

Dates

Born 20 Oct 1932
Activity 1952-ongoing

Places

Born in United States
Active in United States

Activities

Primary

Novelist
Playwright / Dramatist
Poet

Resources

The author of more than twenty volumes of poetry, over twenty plays, two novels, and three collections of essays, Michael McClure’s most powerful and persistent message is that humans must strive to regain their biological identity as mammals. Writing in what his friend Gary Snyder calls a “biological / wild / unconscious / fairytale / new / scientific / imagination form” (The Real Work 124), McClure pushes his readers to reconsider their place in the world, to question and revolt against man-made political structures, and to reexamine their relationship to the rest of nature. “LET US THROW OUT THE WORD MAN!”, he urges, and seek in place of this limited role the “mammalian possibility” of “a larger place” …

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2363 words

Citation: Phillips, Rod. "Michael McClure". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 22 May 2012 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=3031, accessed 31 October 2024.]

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