ABSTRACT
David Lehman intricately analyzes the origins and specific distinction of the American prose poem. His disquisition offers much food for thought about a genre which, like the short story, resists definition. In the Poetics, Aristotle linked Plato's Socratic dialogues to the mimos, but observed that 'this form of imitation is to this day without a name'. The problems of defining the prose poem go back at least as far as Aristotle's quandary. Partly because of the philosophical stakes of language crafted in certain ways or toward certain ends, surrealists in general, and Andre Breton in particular, favored poetry to prose. As precursors of the English-language prose poem, Lehman cites the King James Bible, Shakespeare's prose (in Hamlet), John Donne's sermons, William Blake's 'Marriage of Heaven and Hell', and other pertinent examples. The only American member of Oulipo, Harry Mathews, is likewise anthologized by Lehman because of his diaristic 20 Lines a Day.
