Unlimited Eligibility?: Inclusive Democracy and the American Lyric

by Ryan Cull

Overview

Rewrites the dominant narrative of the political work of lyric poetry in the United States since the nineteenth century.

What if increased visibility of marginalized identities—a goal of much socially committed lyric poetry in the United States—does not necessarily lead to increased social recognition? For many contemporary scholars, this is the central question of lyric politics.Unlimited Eligibility? revisits and deeply historicizes this question. Ryan Cull explores the relationship of a diverse set of poets, including Walt Whitman, Jean Toomer, Hart Crane, James Merrill, Thylias Moss, and Claudia Rankine, to a series of movements intended to build inclusion: the St. Louis Hegelians, cultural pluralism, identity politics, and multiculturalism. In tracing the tensions in lyric poetry's merger with the pursuit of recognition, Cull offers a new history of the political work of lyric poetry while exposing the discursive roots of the nation's faltering progress toward becoming a more inclusive democracy.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9798855802238
Publisher:	State University of New York Press
Publication date:	11/02/2025
Series:	SUNY series in Multiethnic Literatures
Pages:	308
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.80(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Ryan Cull is Associate Professor of English at New Mexico State University.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction Recognizing American Lyrics

1. "We Fathom You Not — We Love You": Walt Whitman Resists the Emerging Politics of Recognition

2. Jean Toomer's "The Blue Meridian" and the "Social Prison" of Cultural Pluralism

3. Looking without Recognizing: Hart Crane's Lyric Sociality

4. Burlesquing Recognition: James Merrill's Formalism

5. More Rapid than Recognition: Thylias Moss's Lyric Velocity

Coda "Join Me Down Here in Nowhere"

Notes
Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

"Unlimited Eligibility? offers a highly original approach to American poetry, tracking the relationship between lyric form and sociopolitical recognition, from Walt Whitman to Claudia Rankine. Assembling a cohort of poets rarely studied together, Ryan Cull shows how American poetry both engages with and refutes Hegelian ideas and practices of recognition, whereby two parties mutually recognize one another and themselves as free and equal persons. Cull performs deft close readings of well—known and understudied poems, showing how poets have engaged directly with Hegel's work, assimilated broader ideas about the political value of recognition, and questioned its potential as a means to achieve justice." — Sarah Dowling, author of Here Is a Figure: Grounding Literary Form

"Unlimited Eligibility? is intellectually compelling, challenging, and timely. One sees many contemporary aesthetic and political discussions of the value and/or danger of poets' and the poetry market's focus on 'identity'—discussions that bear further consideration of the ideals of recognition and representation in democratic politics. In doing this critical work, Ryan Cull's book promises to serve as a touchpoint for many future scholars." — Gillian White, author of Lyric Shame: The "Lyric" Subject of Contemporary American Poetry

From the Publisher