Rose Solari Joins in a Dickinson Tradition at this Year’s Tell it Slant Festival
For the first time, Tell it Slant Festival is going digital. Make sure you catch the final days of the Emily Dickinson Poetry Marathon.
While the Emily Dickinson poetry marathon is not a marathon in the traditional sense, it does test the endurance, fortitude, and preparedness of all its participants. Over a seven day period, 14 hours in all, participants will read every one of the enigmatic 19th-century poet's 1,789 poems in the order prescribed by R.W. Franklin's The Poems of Emily Dickinson.
This year's Tell it Slant Festival, for the first time, is entirely virtual. This means that it is open to anyone who wishes to watch the spectacle of 20 or so professional poets reading the entirety of Dickinson's oeuvre.
One of the poets reading on day 4, September 17th, will be ASP's own Rose Solari. Solari will be reading from poems 661-918. Day four is hosted by none other than the Folger's Shakespeare Library. Anyone can register as a listener HERE.
Remembering W.S. Merwin: Grace Cavalieri’s Two Interviews with the Literary Giant
In 2000, the bicentennial of the Library of Congress, four Poets Laureate were appointed just for the occasion. The four dignitaries were W.S. Merwin, Robert Pinsky, Rita Dove, and Louise Gluck. I was to record one after the other for 4 hours. That first meeting with Merwin was unforgettable, as he arrived for an hour interview without so much as one poem in his hands. Fortunately, I had brought ten books for his signature and we puzzled our way through. He was delighted to recognize some of his first slim published volumes that were out of print, as well as a few collector’s items.
Fiddlin’ Around in Ireland
Nothing buoys the spirits like a walk along Grafton Street. Gray day or sunny, it’s bright with noise and laughter. Loud “hellos,” babies crying, neighborly gossip, rich brogues and lilting Irish airs float up onto the breeze. Our chosen course allowed for a stroll through St. Stephen’s Green. Sunlight dappled the leafy brakes. Inspired by the moment, Lawrence liberated his fiddle and sawed out a hornpipe. He was joined in his performance by a pair of amorous ducks.
On Grafton street we were immediately surrounded by music. A couple of 9 and 10-year-old boys, Donald Reagon and Paul O’Neill, were delighting passersby with smooth moves on the fiddle and concertina. College students with shaved heads played sitars. Old men played jazz. A guitarist somewhere was plucking out George Harrison tunes and singing, “Here comes the sun, little darlin’ here comes the sun.”
On that musical street there was only one poet—a threadbare character who, for a pound or a punt (Irish pound) or nothing at all, would recite a poem by a poet of one’s choosing. I selected Yeats and was honored with “The Fiddler of Dooney”:
“When I play on my fiddle in Dooney, Folk dance like a wave of the sea . . .”
An Interview with Elizabeth Hazen, Baltimore Poet and Baker Award Finalist
Baltimore poet, Elizabeth Hazen’s first collection of poems is entitled Chaos Theories. Last week the young poet was announced as a finalists for the prestigious Baker Artist Award in literature. We sat down to talk with her about her experience in Baltimore as an artist and what programs like The Baker Awards mean to artists.