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The published correspondence of famous poets often accounts for more real estate on bookstore shelves than their books of poems. For academic scholars who spend their weekends in the special-collections rooms of libraries, the value of these books is obvious. But what are they worth to the general reader, or the practicing poet?
On April 4, United States District Court Judge John F. Keenan ruled in favor of Stuart Y. Silverstein in a plagiarism suit he filed against Penguin Putnam in 2001. Silverstein, who compiled Not Much Fun: The Lost Poems of Dorothy Parker (Scribner, 1996), claimed in his lawsuit that Penguin infringed on his copyright by publishing Dorothy Parker: Complete Poems, which includes a section titled “Poems Uncollected by Parker,” the identical poems published in Not Much Fun.
This year marks the centennial of Niedecker's birth. To celebrate, libraries and bookstores in her home state are planning a series of events that will draw poets, scholars, and readers to the places that inspired and influenced her poetry.
When James Merrill died in 1994, he willed his large, turn-of-the-century house on Water Street to the Borough of Stonington, Connecticut. The village improvement committee was free to use the building any way it desired; Merrill made no stipulation in his will. But the National Book Award–winning poet had been an important figure in the village's ongoing literary tradition. The committee decided to keep Merrill's legacy alive by creating a writer-in-residence program. Since 1996, a lucky poet or scholar has lived, for either six months or a full year, in Merrill's curious home across from the harbor. Writers chosen for residency are notified more than a year in advance. Several Merrill House residents have reported "the happiest period of my life," surrounded by Merrill's books and knickknacks, far removed from the snarl of city life—Boston, New York, or Louisville, in our case.
During the past year, poets laureate have been the unlikely recipients of national media attention. New Jersey's Amiri Baraka was excoriated for reading a poem that some labeled anti-Semitic, and California's Quincy Troupe resigned after inaccuracies were discovered on his resumé. With their public profiles growing, the role of poets laureate is being called into question. In April the nation's first conference for state poets laureate will convene in Manchester, New Hampshire, where they will discuss poetry and their responsibilities as public representatives of their art.
To coincide with National Poetry Month, the Library of America, a nonprofit publisher of American classics, will launch the American Poets Project, a new series of books devoted to individual poets and anthologies exploring particular themes, genres, and eras.
In 1995 Brian Henry joined forces with Andrew Zawacki to resurrect Verse magazine. In 2000 he elicited the help of Matthew Zapruder and co-founded Verse Press. Along the way Henry, an assistant professor of English and director of the creative writing program at the University of Georgia, established a broad international reputation, both for his editorial and critical efforts, and for his sizable creative output.
Last spring I embarked on a modest project. Having photocopied 10 of my favorite poems—by poets living and dead, from several different countries—I stapled them into an anthology and stood on a sidewalk in Times Square, where I read the poems aloud. I had no other gimmicks and no amplification. I did this on several occasions, always bringing a friend along for moral support and to assist in handing out free copies of the anthology, which I titled "Antidote."
Lorine Niedecker: Collected Works, edited by Jenny Penberthy, a professor of English at Capilano College in Vancouver, was published in April by the University of California Press. The collection presents all of her surviving poetry and plays.
Claudia Keelan was born in 1959 in Anaheim, California. She is the author of three books of poetry, Refinery (Cleveland State University (1994), The Secularist (University of Georgia, 1997), and Utopic (Alice James, 2000). A graduate of the University of Iowa Writers Workshop, Keelan directs the MFA program at the University of Nevada Las Vegas.
