Robert Lowell in Love

Biographer Meyers (Hemingway: A Biography) has immersed himself in the world of Robert Lowell: this is his third book on the poet. Here the author focuses on women in Lowell's life (1917–77), including his three wives, nine of his lovers, and his female friends and students. Meyers writes that these women were not only inspirational for Lowell's poetry but resided "at the emotional and aesthetic center of his life." He begins with a discussion of Lowell's mother, Charlotte, an often cruel and domineering figure. Anne Dick, an early girlfriend, is described as "the first of Lowell's many gauche and ultimately unhappy courtships." The drama only continues with the poet's marriages, which are characterized as violent and chaotic. Some of Meyers's commentary is curious. For example, he mentions the damaging or deceptive treatment of women by T.S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, and others. Is this to suggest that Lowell is simply following a male literary tradition? The meaning is not clear.