The acclaimed US writer talks about why he finds poetry the most irresistible – if embarrassing - medium
You recently wrote a monograph, The Hatred of Poetry. To what extent do you, as a poet, hate poetry?
My first teacher and dear friend, the person to whom No Art is dedicated, CD Wright, was a great poet who died recently. When I was an undergraduate, she was a hero to me. I remember telling her once – I was a kid – that I was frustrated with writing, and she said: “I hate poetry half the time.” She was kind of joking, kind of not. Any art, maybe poetry in particular, is caught up in a repetitive experience of disappointment – the distance between what you want to do and can do.
Poetry is this space where every single particle of language is charged with the most meaning
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