Includes bibliographical references (p. 1169-1170) and index.

Introduction: "You Didn't Write, You Rewrote" -- Lord Weary's Castle (1946) -- The Mills of the Kavanaughs (1951) -- Life Studies (1959) -- Imitations (1961) -- For the Union Dead (1964) -- Near the Ocean (1967) -- History (1973) -- For Lizzie and Harriet (1973) -- The Dolphin (1973) -- Day by Day (1977) -- Last Poems (1977) -- I. Land of Unlikeness (1944) -- II. Akhmatova and Mandelstam -- III. Magazine Versions -- IV. Two Sequences from Notebook -- V. Uncollected Poems -- VI. Poems in Manuscript -- VII. "After Enjoying Six or Seven Essays on Me" -- Afterword: "On 'Confessional' Poetry"

"Frank Bidart and David Gewanter have compiled the definitive edition of Lowell's work, from his first, impossible-to-find collection, Land of Unlikeness, to the early triumph of Lord Weary's Castle, winner of the 1946 Pulitzer Prize; to the brilliant willfulness of his versions of poems by Sappho, Baudelaire, Rilke, Montale, and other masters in Imitations; to the late spontaneity of The Dolphin, winner of another Pulitzer Prize; to his last, most searching book, Day by Day. This volume also includes poems and translations never previously collected, and a selection of drafts that demonstrate the poet's constant drive to reimagine his work. Frank Bidart has contributed an introduction and an afterword that discuss Lowell's idiosyncratic approach to poem-making. The book includes voluminous notes and a glossary of important names."--BOOK JACKET.