SOURCE: “Louis Simpson: In Search of the American Self,” in The World's Hieroglyphic Beauty: Five American Poets, University of Georgia Press, 1985, pp. 109–39.

In the following essay, Stitt provides an overview of Simpson's poetic development, his American sensibility, his thematic preoccupation with ordinary American experience and social alienation, and his aesthetic and stylistic approach to poetry.

The story American literature tells is so often that of a virtuous individual, who seeks complete freedom for self-expression, pitted against a community that is at best repressive and at worst unjust, perhaps even immoral. Consider Melville's White Jacket and Billy Budd, rebels against society's sanctioned injustices. Consider his Bartleby, who in response to every entreaty from his eminently reasonable, successful, middle-American boss, says “I would prefer not to.” Consider Huck Finn, who follows the promptings of his own heart, his innate sense of virtue, over what society tells him is right; “All...