The Bible in American Poetic Culture

Although the Bible is the foundation of American poetic tradition there is no study of the Bible as an ongoing force in American poetry. Not only a source of imagery allusion rhythm and style the Bible is central to how poetry has both shaped and been shaped by American civic political and social history including issues of ethnicity race and gender. Through poetry core issues of the Bible in American culture emerge in a new light. What defines America as a nation? What are its historical political and religious meanings and direction? Vitally how is it that the Bible is at once a shared common text binding community and yet was throughout American culture also contested disputed and politicized as a weapon of war? This study begins with the Puritans and goes on to examine poetry of the Revolutionary and Civil Wars as well as claims and counterclaims in abolition slavery and women���s rights. In doing so it treats both popular and major writers including Edward TaylorFrances Harper Emerson Whitman Dickinson Moore and Gwendoln Brooks concluding with Amanda Gorman.