Gee, how embarrassing that I forgot it's National Poetry Month. And how wonderful that you reminded me. Do you remember (as I do) that you were a bit leery of poetry when we met and perhaps still are of some of the contemporaries.
Anyway,I went to the Science series of the City Arts and Lectures program Wednesday night where Kay Ryan was being interviewed. Why she was in the Science series I didn't know, so I asked the Director of Morrison Planetarium (part of the California Academy of Sciences which sponsors the Science series): "Well, she does have a lot of poems about birds," was his reply.
She said things about poetry you don't often hear:
Interviewer: Do you fear for poetry given its ever-shrinking audience? (Words to that effect anyway.) Kay Ryan: I don't really care about the state of poetry. Poetry is like a coin. A coin can be lost for a thousand years and yet when it turns up again, it still has value. Again, this is not verbatim.)
Answering another question:
"Poetry is not for everyone. Poetry is an aristiocratic endeavor. Not an aristocracy of money or class but of intelligence and perception."
Whoa! To hear such a blatantly elitist (not a bad word in my vocabulary)comment was refreshing.
My pleasure - I also commented at the Random Reading thread. I hope to call this weekend but also have Sam both days, with his broken arm. The broken arm is a "climbing structure" accident. Climbing structures are what kids now call what we used to call "jungle gyms". Why is it all the replacement words and phrases are always so colorless?
COLETTE
Gee, how embarrassing that I forgot it's National Poetry Month. And how wonderful that you reminded me. Do you remember (as I do) that you were a bit leery of poetry when we met and perhaps still are of some of the contemporaries.
ReplyDeleteAnyway,I went to the Science series of the City Arts and Lectures program Wednesday night where Kay Ryan was being interviewed. Why she was in the Science series I didn't know, so I asked the Director of Morrison Planetarium (part of the California Academy of Sciences which sponsors the Science series): "Well, she does have a lot of poems about birds," was his reply.
She said things about poetry you don't often hear:
Interviewer: Do you fear for poetry given its ever-shrinking audience? (Words to that effect anyway.)
Kay Ryan: I don't really care about the state of poetry. Poetry is like a coin. A coin can be lost for a thousand years and yet when it turns up again, it still has value. Again, this is not verbatim.)
Answering another question:
"Poetry is not for everyone. Poetry is an aristiocratic endeavor. Not an aristocracy of money or class but of intelligence and perception."
Whoa! To hear such a blatantly elitist (not a bad word in my vocabulary)comment was refreshing.
Amen, Brother, Amen! Thank you, darling, for this.
ReplyDeleteMy pleasure - I also commented at the Random Reading thread. I hope to call this weekend but also have Sam both days, with his broken arm. The broken arm is a "climbing structure" accident. Climbing structures are what kids now call what we used to call "jungle gyms". Why is it all the replacement words and phrases are always so colorless?
ReplyDelete