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Category Archives: Reading
James Wright on the Olympian syndicate
In 1958, in July, [Wright] wrote me a letter (I’m sure similar letters went to others) in which he announced that he was through writing poems. […] The first issue of Robert Bly’s magazine, The Fifties, which he read at … Continue reading
Posted in Reading
Tagged Donald Hall, James Wright, poetry, Theodore Roethke
Joseph Harrison on writing and Penelope
Penelope’s situation (in Homer, of course, it’s a death shroud she’s weaving) seems to me an interesting figure for the predicament of the writer or artist: making something, ripping it up, making something, ripping it up, all the while vaguely … Continue reading
W. H. Auden on the function of poetry (1938)
The primary function of poetry, as of all the arts, is to make us more aware of ourselves and the world around us. I do not know if such increased awareness makes us more moral or more efficient;I hope not. … Continue reading
Posted in Poetry's function, Reading
Tagged function of poetry, James Fenton, Plato, poetry, The New York Review of Books, W. H. Auden
Leigh Hunt on reading poetry while eating (1821)
Every lover of books, scholar or not, who knows what it is to have his quarto open against a loaf at his tea … ought to be in possession of Mr. Coleridge’s poems, if it is only for ‘Christabel’, ‘Kubla … Continue reading
Posted in Reading
Tagged Coleridge, Kubla Khan, Leigh Hunt, poetry, Reading
Robert Lowell and confessional poetry (Lost Puritan)
Soon Lowell walked in with several other dons, was introduced, and read. Afterwards, the don who’d introduced [Lowell] asked if there were any questions and, when no one raised their hand, [Michael] Waters asked Lowell about his confessional poems. At … Continue reading
Posted in Reading
Tagged confessional poetry, Paul Mariani, Robert Lowell, Skunk Hour
Susannah Herbert on not marketing poetry as a vitamin pill
The whole evangelical look-lovely-poems-are-good-for-you schtick assumes poetry is a precious endangered superfood, somewhere between a vitamin pill and a rare flower. Wrong. It should be ranked among life-forms that will survive nuclear holocaust: jellyfish, cockroaches, Millwall fans. Any effective campaign … Continue reading
Posted in Reading
Tagged promoting poetry, Susannah Herbert
