pbWINNER OF THE NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATUREb pbA luminous collection of essays from Louise Gl ck, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature and one of our most original and influential poetsb pFive decades after her debut poetry collection, iFirstborni, Louise Gl ck is a towering figure in American letters. Written with the same probing, analytic control that has long distinguished her poetry, iAmerican Originality iis Gl ck's second book of essays--her first, iProofs and Theoriesi, won the 1993 PENMartha Albrand Award for First Nonfiction. Gl ck's moving and disabusing lyricism is on full display in this decisive new collection. p From its opening pages, iAmerican Originalityi forces readers to consider contemporary poetry and its demigods in radical, unconsoling, and ultimately very productive ways. Determined to wrest ample, often contradictory meaning from our current literary discourse, Gl ck comprehends and destabilizes notions of narcissism and genius that are unique to the American