An introduction to Rita Dove by Grace Cavalieri
In a stunning video, Grace covers the life and work of the first female of color US Poet Laureate
"If critics look at a literary model of a balanced life, the thinking, feeling, sensual, and intuitive, this can be seen as a template for Rita Dove’s writing."
Grace Cavalieri's new web series "20th-Century Poets Commentaries" is off to a strong start with introductions and commentaries on such poets as Robert Hayden, Ted Kooser, Robert Pinsky, and Josephine Jacobsen.
Rita Dove, the first female of color to hold the vaunted position of US poet laureate, claims an important place in late 20th-century poetry and American history.
Her Pulitzer Prize-winning collection Thomas and Beulah, Grace explains, displays her use of intuition in creating semi-biographical poems that reach, in Dove's words, to the "inner-truth."
You can support Grace's mission to create a video on every US Poet Laureate (and then some) by buying her book Other Voices, Other Lives.
All of her commentaries are produced by Forest Woods Media (a 501c3).
Linda Watanabe McFerrin Interviewed for Author Matthew Felix’s Video Podcast
Author and poet Linda Watanabe McFerrin sat down with Matthew Felix, himself an author of some renown, for Matthew’s video podcast this last weekend. What follows is an in-depth, thoughtful, and often irreverent look at writing, life, travel, and zombies. And more, we get to hear many of the juicy details on Linda’s new Legacy Book due out from ASP in Autumn 2019…
Fact or Fiction
…And so it is for me, as I send an invented “namesake” into worlds I know vicariously but haven’t lived—Hollywood and hippies, communes and con artists, Woodstock and the Summer of Love. In the opening of Melanie’s Song, J.J. is poised at the edge of the Pacific reflecting on where she has been and where she is going. She is endowed with a deep and spiritual connection to a native place we share, but I am also setting her free to fly into her own undiscovered territory.
Featured Poetry: “Bluebirds” by Grace Cavalieri
Other Voices, Other Lives was my introduction to Grace. Her book sits now on my shelf between The Waves and Duino Elegies, the pages are worn from thumbing-thru, it is dog-eared, destroyed in certain ways well-loved books are destroyed, aged by the eyes, like good denim, but here the creases are black underlines, and the fading is from yellow highlighter and coffee stains. So in honor of, well, my deep admiration for Grace, I’ve picked one of her poems from Other Voices, Other Lives to share. If this is the first encounter with her poetry, welcome, hello, the books page is just yonder up the screen under “books”! If you’ve long been a fan, I think “Bluebirds” is a great poem to share with those who might not yet have been introduced to Grace’s work.