Generously sampling the best Mormon poetry of the twentieth century, Harvest can be considered a definitive anthology. The younger poets in this collection, observes Dennis Clark, are moving in “new directions,” writing verse that “takes as its medium not text but the sounds of language.” They attempt—and succeed—in sharing with readers “some of the beauty and joy language first gave them, some of the playfulness, some of the fun, some of the truth.”
The senior poets, explains Eugene England, favor traditional verse reflecting deep concern about “ideas and values, even some extremely specific ones they claim to know through inspiration.” Generally more concerned about structure than innovation, these poets nonetheless exhibit pleasure in experimentation and irony, and their verse is reminiscent of that of John Keats—or T. S. Elliott—powerful, beautiful, and surprisingly profound.
Among Harvest‘s more than sixty contributors are Elouise Bell, Mary Blanchard, Mary Lythgoe Bradford, R. A. Christmas, Colin B. Douglas, Eugene England, Kathy Evans, Steven William Graves, Laura Hamblin, Lewis Horne, Susan Howe, Donnell Hunter, Bruce W. Jorgensen, Karl Keller, Lance Larsen, Clinton F. Larson, Timothy Liu, Karen Marguerite Moloney, Margaret Rampton Munk, Dixie Lee Partridge, Carol Lynn Pearson, Robert A. Rees, Karl C. Sandberg, Loretta Randall Sharp, Linda Sillitoe, May Swenson, Emma Lou Thayne, Philip White, Ronald Wilcox, and David L. Wright.
