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Writers & Their Work #78
Robert Graves, his life and work
This biography was first published in 1982. Martin Seymour-Smith had known Robert Graves since early boyhood, and had lived in his house for more than three years. He wrote it with Grave's help, at his home in Deya, while Graves' (sometime) mistress and muse, the notorious Laura Riding, was still alive. Since then, some of the material Seymour-Smith deliberately suppressed has been aired, and is no longer as sensitive as it was. In this revised, expanded and largely rewritten edition, he sets the record straight.
- GenresBiography
672 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1982
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
October 8, 2012
The original 1982 edition of this book was useful, if partisan, but his 1995 rewrite has made it jumbled, unreliable and full of bile.
January 8, 2013
Except for Graves, Cohen, Thomas, Yeats, Shakespeare and Browning, I haven't read much "modern" poetry since college. It really ought be read aloud, for that an audience is preferred and the process is time-consuming. Besides, it's fiction, not fact and life is short.
Graves is a special poet, his poetry being, first, supplemented by essays, translations, novels and theoretics--much of which I've read--and, second, informed by a globalizing theory of poetics which takes into account history, anthropology, psychology and religion. Long have I been fascinated by the spectre of his White Goddess, meaning to read it, but too hesitant to begin.
Seymour-Smith, a younger friend of Graves, has produced a straightforward biography of the opinionated poet which at once covers his life in some detail and attempts to get at what the author believes to be the essence of his subject's poetic theory and practice.
Unlike many other devotees of the muse, Graves took his poetic task quite concretely. The story of his mature writings, his serious writings, is dialectically tied to the story of his love life. Interestingly, it wasn't much, not in terms of the sex act at least. With only three serious sexual relationships during a long lifetime, much of his love poetry is an exercise of sublimation, an aspirant yearning for the goddess revealed, yet masked, in individual women whom he loved in both aspects.
In fact, Graves was sexually conservative while being, according to Seymour-Smith's account, romantically excessive. Even as an old, happily married man he still pursued, albeit without fornicatory intent, young women, helping them with the practical affairs of their lives while holding them in aweful respect as manifestations of the holy. Some dominated him, some used him, some were frightened by him, a few may have understood and appreciated what he was doing. In any case, excepting his early war poems, his pursuit of the divine feminine led to an unparalleledly long series of love poems.
Although I do not subscribe to Graves' discredited theories of an original matriarchal matrix and although sympathetically feminist, the archetypes he evokes often personally resonate, sometimes unnervingly. The matriarchal matrix is a myth, but it is a very old one told in many ways by many cultures.
The myth, however, is primarily the product of males. The few female poets discussed, especially Laura Riding to whom he was long devoted, did not much participate in it in their own work, not like he did, not as female poets in service of any male muse. One wonders what old Robert Graves would have made of such.
Graves is a special poet, his poetry being, first, supplemented by essays, translations, novels and theoretics--much of which I've read--and, second, informed by a globalizing theory of poetics which takes into account history, anthropology, psychology and religion. Long have I been fascinated by the spectre of his White Goddess, meaning to read it, but too hesitant to begin.
Seymour-Smith, a younger friend of Graves, has produced a straightforward biography of the opinionated poet which at once covers his life in some detail and attempts to get at what the author believes to be the essence of his subject's poetic theory and practice.
Unlike many other devotees of the muse, Graves took his poetic task quite concretely. The story of his mature writings, his serious writings, is dialectically tied to the story of his love life. Interestingly, it wasn't much, not in terms of the sex act at least. With only three serious sexual relationships during a long lifetime, much of his love poetry is an exercise of sublimation, an aspirant yearning for the goddess revealed, yet masked, in individual women whom he loved in both aspects.
In fact, Graves was sexually conservative while being, according to Seymour-Smith's account, romantically excessive. Even as an old, happily married man he still pursued, albeit without fornicatory intent, young women, helping them with the practical affairs of their lives while holding them in aweful respect as manifestations of the holy. Some dominated him, some used him, some were frightened by him, a few may have understood and appreciated what he was doing. In any case, excepting his early war poems, his pursuit of the divine feminine led to an unparalleledly long series of love poems.
Although I do not subscribe to Graves' discredited theories of an original matriarchal matrix and although sympathetically feminist, the archetypes he evokes often personally resonate, sometimes unnervingly. The matriarchal matrix is a myth, but it is a very old one told in many ways by many cultures.
The myth, however, is primarily the product of males. The few female poets discussed, especially Laura Riding to whom he was long devoted, did not much participate in it in their own work, not like he did, not as female poets in service of any male muse. One wonders what old Robert Graves would have made of such.
September 10, 2021
Original 1982 edition.
A long and interesting life. A story well told by an author who knew his subject well
A long and interesting life. A story well told by an author who knew his subject well
October 28, 2023
Evil subject, evil author. Graves must surely win the 'Biggest Simp of All Time' award.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews