This Business of Words

Long overshadowed by fellow confessional poets Sylvia Plath and Robert Lowell, Anne Sexton seldom features in literary criticism, despite being one of America’s most influential women writers. Now in this much-needed volume Sexton and her poetry are reassessed for the first time in two decades. With new access to her archives, the scholars and poets featured here consider Sexton’s wide range of literary production: how it shaped her creative process, informs readings of her work, and reveals her efforts to build a successful career without a university education. Notable in presenting Sexton the educator and public figure, This Business of Words also considers her relationships with peers and various media and interprets her strategies for teaching, critiquing poems, and delivering readings. As they revisit their initial encounters with Sexton as readers, writers, and teachers, the contributors to this volume map the influence of her craft on twenty-first-century culture.