Amid the dazzling mix of grunge and bohemia that was New York immediately after World War II, John Ashbery, Frank O'Hara, James Schuyler and Kenneth Koch, four young poets on the rise, found each other.

This quartet formed the core of the New York School of Poets, and they were an integral part of the city's literary scene at the pinnacle of its prosperity and influence. All around them was a seemingly unending procession of artistic innovations: from action painting to hard bop, Beat poetry to Pop Art. They attended the same parties and exhibitions, drank in the same bars, slept with the same people. They became a collective powered by loyalty, mutual encouragement and competition. They didn't reject the establishment so much as they ignored it, seeking to 'do something with language / That has never been done before.'

Evan Kindley expertly guides readers through the dorm rooms, editorial offices, gay bars, Pacific war scenes, art galleries, Fire Island summer houses and squalid apartments in which the New York School was shaped. Both nostalgic and clear-sighted, The New York School paints a striking group portrait of this coterie, highlighting fame and folly, competition and collaboration, and ultimately, enduring friendship.



Evan Kindley was born in New York City in 1979. He is a founding editor of the Los Angeles Review of Books and an associate editor at The Chronicle Review. His previous books include Questionnaire and Poet-Critics and the Administration of Culture, and his writing has appeared in The New York Review of Books, The Nation, The New Republic and other publications. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife and daughter.



In his deeply researched, brilliantly written book, The New York School, Evan Kindley adds a crucial chapter to the story of artistic revolution in mid-twentieth century New York by reminding us that the ferment wasn't just about paint - it involved words...I defy readers to withstand the romance of the moment Kindley so beautifully describes and to resist the urge to relive it through the New York School Poets' verse.



The New York School manages to feel both expansive and concise...Tucked within his tender portrait of this close-knit crew, Kindley delivers fresh readings of some of the twentieth century's best known poems



This is literary history at its most engaging: alive to the wit, rivalries and unlikely alliances that fueled their work, Kindley reveals how a loose-knit circle of downtown originals changed the course of modern poetry. A compelling account of how art emerges from the charged space between individual genius and collective life