Private Fire

Matthew J. Babcock's Private Fire: Robert Francis's Ecopoetry and Prose presents an introduction to and analysis of nearly six decades of nature-centered literature produced by one of America's most intriguing but tragically obscure writers. Private Fire tracks the steady trajectory of Francis's life and career, situates him among more visible twentieth-century writers, and presents a broad and eclectic explication of his contribution to American environmental literature. Specifically, readers will investigate the influence Dickinson and Frost exerted on Francis, Francis's traditional and experimental poetry, his satirical essays, his novel and wilderness sketches, and his published and unpublished ruminations on spirituality, homoerotics, vegetarianism, and pacifism during World War II and Vietnam. Major themes include poetry and political dissidence, aesthetics and poverty, sexuality and nature, environmental preservation, literature and over-mechanization, and conservation in the age of industry and information.