Their Labyrinth Mouths of History

Abstract

This paper outlines reading strategies to help map Hart Crane’s book-length poem, The Bridge, as a repository of American runes and writing. Contextualizing the poem in the philosophical, historical, and popular culture that influenced its creation, we can examine Hart Crane’s linguistic condensation, puns, and etymological play as techniques for balancing the clash between eternity and secular history upon which America was founded, rehearsed in The Bridge in the clash between secular a-temporality and the historical moment.