Ron Slate's blog
March 7th, 2010
on Stone Lyre, poems by René Char, translated by Nancy Naomi Carlson (Tupelo Press)
When René Char died in 1988 at the age of 80, President Jacques Chirac called him “the greatest French poet of the twentieth century.” The writer Françoise Giraud remarked that Chirac “would read poetry behind a copy of Playboy” presumably to preserve his reputation as a seducer, but it’s more likely that Chirac encouraged the anecdote.
March 3rd, 2010
on The Stranger Manual, poems by Catie Rosemurgy (Graywolf Press)
It’s been more than 30 years since I heard Bill Matthews remark at a reading that a poet must submit to confusion and fear – and not make poems as charms against them. As intended, his counsel stiffened my spine. Who could argue?
