A Poetry Daily Prose Feature:
"Starting from the everyday experience of being in a car heading into the city on a clogged highway, the winner of the 2011 Nobel Prize in Literature, Tomas Tranströmer, wrote:
I know that I have to go far away,
straight through the city, out
the other side, then step out
and walk a long time in the woods.
Walk in the tracks of the badger.
("Further In," from Stigar [1973],
tr. Robert Bly)
More than an invitation to wildness, or a marker of the contrast between the civilized and the natural worlds, this, the first badger to appear in Tranströmer's poetry, was a manifest nod to Robert Bly and his role as guide."—Mark Gustafson, Tranströmer and the Badger.
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American Life in Poetry:
Ted Kooser introduces "Taos" by Jillena Rose. (American Life in Poetry)
TLS poem of the week:
Robin Robertson's "The Eel" (after Eugenio Montale) is introduced by Andrew McCulloch. (The Times Literary Supplement)
"... I tell them that I was just another high school kid who wrote poems in order to impress girls":
Charles Simic explains why he still writes poetry. (The New York Review of Books)
"... it's moving, but you can't predict where it's going to be next."
Broc Russell tells the story of Wave Press. (Los Angeles Review of Books)
"... literary x-rays":
At the 2012 International Symposium for Poetry and Medicine, home to the Hippocrates Prize for Poetry and Medicine, the two disciplines are united. (New Scientist)
Performance of "Thomas and Beulah":
Anne Gustafson reviews the performance of Rita Dove's Pulitzer Prize winning work, performed at Queens College in a collaboration with the Poetry Society of America. (Queens Chronicle)
The Guardian poem of the week:
Carol Rumens presents "The Fine Old English Gentleman: New Version" by Charles Dickens. (The Guardian)
"a windswept spirit":
Brian Seibert reviews Anne Carson's "Nox", as choreographed by Rashaun Mitchell at Danspace Project. (The New York Times)
Chronicle Monday poem:
Lisa Russ Sparr introduces "After the Angelectomy" by Alice Fulton. (The Chronicle of Higher Education)
Can art replace violence?
Fintan O'Toole considers whether the explicit depiction of violence can satisfy the human instinct. (The Irish Times)
The Guardian Saturday Poem:
"Still" by Dennis O'Driscoll. (The Guardian)
Al Qaeda and the Taliban:
Faisal Devji reflects on the poetry of Islamic militancy. (The New York Times)
"... flirtatiously surreal":
Heather Christle wins the annual Believer Poetry Award for The Trees The Trees. (The Believer)
American Life in Poetry:
Ted Kooser introduces "Disarmed" by Wendy Videlock. (American Life in Poetry)
TLS poem of the week:
David Balfour's "Lurlei" is introduced by Andrew McCulloch. (The Times Literary Supplement)
"Walcott has updated the epic form for a new age":
Andrew Singer analyzes Derek Walcott's Omeros. (Open Letters Monthly)
"... due to a deep fatalism, not ignorance":
Adam Kirsch discusses Barack Obama's undergraduate recommendation of Eliot. (The New York Times)
The Guardian poem of the week:
Carol Rumens introduces Ben Jonson's "Inviting a Friend to Supper." (The Guardian)
Another try at Canterbury Tales:
Twenty-four modern pilgrims reenact the 65-mile route to Canterbury. (The Guardian)
Last lecture:
Philip Levine delivers his last lecture as Poet Laureate of the United States. (The Washington Post)
"Self-justifying propoganda"?
Mixed opinions about the publication of the Poetry of the Taliban, recently out in the UK. (The Guardian)
Translation Slam:
As part of the PEN World Voices literary festival, translators "come out of the shadows and talk about what they do." (The New York Times)
"We needed Reece’s story so much that we began to own it for ourselves:"
Sonya Chung remembers her discovery of Spencer Reece's debut poetry collection, The Clerk's Tale. (The Millions)
Recently Arrived Titles
These just in... Highlighted titles may be purchased from Poetry Daily / Amazon.com. A complete
list of all books and journals recently received at Poetry Daily is also available.
- Floricanto en Aztlan, Alurista Hayes-Bautista, illus. by Judithe Hernandez (UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center Press)
- Home Burial, Michael McGriff (Copper Canyon Press)
- On the Spectrum of Possible Deaths, Lucia Perillo (Copper Canyon Press)
- One Hundred Leaves, Blue Flute (CreateSpace)
- Speech Lessons, John Montague (Wake Forest University Press)
- Blue Orange, Robert Grunst (The Ashland Poetry Press)
- The Land of Give and Take, Tyler Farrell (Salmon Poetry)
- Thousands Flee California Wildflowers, Scot Siegel (Salmon Poetry)
- The Storehouses of the Snow: Psalms, Parables and Dreams, Philip Memmer (Lost Horse Press)
- Ways We Hold, Jennifer Arin (Dos Madres Press Inc.)
- And We'd Understand Crows Laughing: Poems (1997-2010), W. Nick Hill (Dos Madres Press Inc.)
- The Organ Builder, Austin macRae (Dos Madres Press Inc.)
- Crow-Blue, Crow Black, Chip Livingston (NYQ Books)
- Language Matters, Tony Quagliano (NYQ Books)
- Dirge for an Imaginary World, Matthew Buckley Smith (Able Muse Press)
- Life in the Second Circle, Michael Cantor (Able Muse Press)
- To Find a New Beauty, Andrea Witzke Slot (Gold Wake Press)
- Sweet Spot, J. T. Barbarese (Curbstone Books)
Recent Anthologies, etc.
- The Wake Forest Book of Irish Women's Poetry, Peggy O'Brien, ed. (Wake Forest University Press)
- The Penguin Anthology of Twentieth-Century American Poetry, Rita Dove, ed. (Penguin)
- The Best American Poetry 2011, David Lehman, Kevin Young, eds. (Scribner)
- Beautiful & Pointless: A Guide to Modern Poetry, David Orr (Harper)
- A Journey with Two Maps: Becoming a Woman Poet, Eavan Boland (W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.)
- The FSG Book of Twentieth-Century Latin American Poetry, Ilan Stavans, ed. (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
- Attack of the Difficult Poems, Charles Bernstein (University of Chicago Press)
- Close Calls with Nonsense: Reading New Poetry, Stephen Burt (Graywolf Press)
- Stepping Stones: Interviews with Seamus Heaney, Dennis O'Driscoll (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
- Quote Poet Unquote: Contemporary Quotations on Poets and Poetry, ed. Dennis O'Driscoll (Copper Canyon Press)
Past Features:
Original
articles, interviews, selections from special collections and journal issues, and more are available in the Archives.
