Dan Jorgensen's Blog, page 84

'The poet's job is to render the world'

 

“Thejob of the poet is to render the world - to see it and report it without loss,without perversion. No poet ever talks about feelings. Only sentimental peopledo.” – Mark Van Doren

I wrote earlier this week about VanDoren, who won the 1940 Pulitzer Prize for his book Collected Poems1922–1938.     The author of numerous shortstories, novels, and plays, Van Doren was above all a poet and a teacher. AsThomas Merton said in a letter to Van Doren, "You always used your giftsto make people admire and understand poetry and good writing andtruth."   For Saturday’s Poem, hereis Van Doren’s,
 

                                           Spring Thunder

 

Listen, The wind is still,
And far away in the night --
See! The uplands fill
With a running light.

Open the doors. It is warm;
And where the sky was clear--
Look! The head of a storm
That marches here!

Come under the trembling hedge--
Fast, although you fumble...
There! Did you hear the edge
of winter crumble?

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A Writer's Moment: 'Write what you see; what you hear'

A Writer's Moment: 'Write what you see; what you hear':   “I simply write what I find to be the way people are. . . I just let my characters go, the way I let life go.” – Caro...

'Write what you see; what you hear'

 

“I simply write what I find to be the way people are. . . I just let my characters go, the way I let life go.” – Carolyn Chute 

 

Born in Maine on this date in 1947,Chute is an award-winning writer (both a GuggenheimFellowship and a Thornton Wilder Award) who writes by hand, lives off the grid(no electricity or running water in her home), and raises much of her own food.

  

 She started writing as a part-time newspapercorrespondent, then taught creative writing while finishing her first novel TheBeans of Egypt, Maine, also made into a well-received movie.

 

Now the author of half-dozen booksand numerous short stories, she is a frequent speaker about class issues inAmerica, strongly identified with the culture of poor, rural western Mainealthough her works speak to other similar regions in the U.S.  

  

Write what you seeand hear, Chute says.   “All I want to do is explore. I want to see what people would do.  I say,'What would this person do in this situation?' and I write it down.”

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'The art of assisting discovery'

 

“Theart of teaching is the art of assisting discovery.” –  Mark Van Doren Born in Illinois on this date in 1894, Van Dorenwas a poet, creative and nonfiction writer, critic, scholar and English professor (atColumbia University for nearly 40 years).  As a teacher he inspired a generation ofinfluential writers and thinkers, including Thomas Merton, Allen Ginsberg andJack Kerouac.   And, Van Doren was literaryeditor and film critic for The Nation, the oldest continuously publishedliterary magazine in the U.S.   Hisinfluence and body of work were recognized by The Library of Congress when hewas made a Fellow in American Letters and then elected President of theAmerican Academy of Arts and Letters.  

Van Doren wrote many of the booksstudied by up-and-coming writers in colleges and universities across thenation, produced the award-winning verse play The Last Days of Lincoln, and won the 1940 Pulitzer Prize in poetry forhis Collected Works 1922-1938,joining older brother Carl as one of the few sibling combinations to win theaward (Carl won in 1939).  
Despite his many successes inother genres, he considered himself apoet first.   
 “The job of the poet," he said, "is to renderthe world - to see it and report it without loss, without perversion.   No poet ever talks about feelings. Onlysentimental people do.”

A Writer's Moment: 'The art of assisting discovery'

A Writer's Moment: 'The art of assisting discovery':   “ The art of teaching is the art of assisting discovery.” –   Mark Van Doren   Born in Illinois on this date in 1894, Van Doren was ...

A Writer's Moment: 'The characters come to life within you'

A Writer's Moment: 'The characters come to life within you':   “The interesting thing about fiction from a writer's standpoint is that the characters come to life within you. And...

'The characters come to life within you'

 

“Theinteresting thing about fiction from a writer's standpoint is that thecharacters come to life within you. And yet who are they and where are they?They seem to have as much or more vitality and complexity as the people aroundyou.” – Whitley Strieber

 

Born in San Antonio, TX, on June 13,1945 Strieber has split his writing talents between horror stories, sciencefiction, and speculative fiction with a social conscience – interrupted (bothliterally and figuratively) by his nonfiction account of being abducted by“non-human visitors.”   That particularbook, Communion, while pooh-poohed as“improbable if not impossible,” was a huge bestseller and a subsequentsuccessful big screen adaptation. 

 

Two of his other books, The Wolfen and The Hunger, also were made into successful films.  Still going strong as he turns 79, these daysStrieber writes for the SyFy Channel, does non-fiction books, and produces a podcast“Dreamland.”  His latest book is 2023’s Them.

  

"Everything ultimately comesdown to the relationship between the reader and the writer and the characters,”Strieber said.   “Does or does not acharacter address moral being in a universal and important way? If it does,then it's literature.”

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A Writer's Moment: 'Most of what we call life'

A Writer's Moment: 'Most of what we call life':   “A novel is balanced between a few true impressions and the multitude of false ones that make up most of what we call l...

'Most of what we call life'

 

“Anovel is balanced between a few true impressions and the multitude of falseones that make up most of what we call life.” – Saul Bellow

Born in Canada on this date in 1915, Bellow later became a naturalized U.S.citizen after attending the University of Chicago and Northwestern where heearned degrees in sociology and anthropology.  The fact that he was ananthropologist probably is not a surprise for his readers who findanthropological references sprinkled throughout his award-winning books.  

 

Best known for The Adventures of Augie March; Herzog; and Humboldt’s Gift, Bellow earned every major writing award includingthe Nobel Prize.  He won the NationalBook Award for Fiction 3 times (the only writer ever to do so); a LifetimeMedal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters; the National Medal ofArts; and 2 Pulitzer Prizes.

 

"The backbone of 20th-centuryAmerican literature has been provided by two novelists,” fellow novelist PhilipRoth said.  “They are William Faulknerand Saul Bellow. Together they are the Melville, Hawthorne, and Twain of the20th Century."  Bellow died in 2005. 

 

“You know, you never have to changeanything you got up in the middle of the night to write down,” Bellowsaid.  “Maybe that's why they’re calleddreams."

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A Writer's Moment: 'Writing poems that matter'

A Writer's Moment: 'Writing poems that matter':   “I want to write poems that matter, that have an interesting point of view.” – Maxine Kumin Born in Philadelphia...