Poet, teacher, and master of equivocation William Stobb discusses poets, poetry, and language without ever making a definitive claim.

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Episode #27
A Quibble and an Homage: My love letter to Poetry

Quibble: I look closely at Poetry's "Curious Specimens: An Exchange" from the May, 2008 issue-a textual conversation between poets Cate Marvin and Joshua Mehigan.  Will Poetry's new "exchange" format lead inevitably to ugly sniping? 

Homage: Christian Wiman's editorial work has revitalized Poetry.  In his important personal essay "Gazing into the Abyss" (in Wiman's Ambition and Survival: Becoming a Poet, Copper Canyon, 2007) he shares his mortal journeys through faith, language, and love-a courageous essay, important for anyone who strives to live deeply, in close relation to human mystery.

Warning: this podcast uses "eddies."
 

Episode #26
A Superior Poetry:  James Armstrong's Blue Lash

In his most recent collection, Blue Lash (Milkweed 2006), Minnesota poet James Armstrong explores the nature and culture of the world's largest body of fresh water, Lake Superior.  Armstrong was featured in the November 2007 installment of the Pump House Regional Arts Center's reading series, in La Crosse, Wisconsin.  Here, he speaks with "Hard to Say" host William Stobb, and reads two poems from Blue Lash.


James Armstrong is Professor of English at Winona State University in southeastern Minnesota.  In addition to Blue Lash, he is the author of Monument in a Summer Hat (New Issues 1999).

Episode #25
LIVE NOISE

March 30, 2008, from the Work/Sound Gallery in Southeast Portland-a multimedia extravaganza, featuring the U. S. launch of Jen Currin's poetry collection Hagiography (2008, Coach House Books), poems from Nervous Systems by William Stobb, sound art by Christine LeClerc, films by Danielle Lombardi, Heather Lane and Jackie Davis, the improv artistry of Mary Rose, music by Love Perestroika, Pelican Ossman, The Formless and DJ no shame beat.
 

Episode #24
The Person Behind the Poem: Remembering Jay Meek

When we teach poetry, we remind students not to confuse the speaker of the poem with its author, and we insist that knowledge of the author's intention is an argumentative fallacy.  Who are we hearing, then, when we hear a poem?  And why do we feel a sense of contact, person to person?  In Hard to Say number 24, William Stobb considers these questions through the work of his late teacher, Jay Meek.  Jay published 7 poetry collections with Carnegie Mellon University Press, earned grants and awards from the National Endowment for the Arts and the John Simmon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.  He passed away in November, 2007.

 

Episode #23
The Screen Inside the Mind: Experiencing Poetic Imagery, Part 2 of 2.

"Hard to Say" extends its imagery inquiry backward and forward in time--back to the founding principles of the imagist movement and an imagist standard by William Carlos Williams, through critical writings by W. J. T. Mitchell, and on up to Joanna Klink's "Day Window," from her most recent colletion, Circadian.

Episode #22
The Screen Inside the Mind: Experiencing Poetic Imagery, Part 1 of 2

The "image" in poetry.  What is it?  "An intellectual and emotional complex in an instant of time," said Ezra, but what does that mean?  What does it feel like?  In this first of a two part series, William Stobb explores the visual experience of poetic imagery through James Wright's "Lying in a Hammock at William Duffy's Farm in Pine Island, Minnesota."
 

Episode #21
Truly Wild: Terry Tempest Williams's Desert Quartet. 

 
Terry Tempest Williams's Desert Quartet infuses environmental writing with a sense of freedom, passion, even eros.  In an era when much environmental writing seeks to correct its audience's behavior, Williams's Desert Quartet offers much needed permission.  Williams is the author of Refuge, Leap, Red, and The Open Space of Democracy.  In 2006, Ms. Williams received the Robert Marshall Award from The Wilderness Society, their highest honor given to an American citizen. For her work, she has also earned awards from the Western American Literature Association, The Center for the American West, the Lannan Foundation, and the Guggenheim Foundation.
 

Episode #20
Going Postal with Max Garland.

Max Garland's The Postal Confessions won the Juniper Prize of the University of Massachussetts Press.  In this episode of "Hard to Say," William Stobb talks with Max about termites, the call of the wild, and the metaphysical origins of hunger. 

Episode #19
A Walk in the Yaak, with Rick Bass and Alison Hawthorne Deming

Alison Hawthorne Deming's latest poetry collection is Genius Loci, published by Penguin-for more on her earlier work, see Hard to Say episode 18.  Rick Bass is the author of numerous books of fiction and non-fiction, including Winter: Notes from Montana, The Book of Yaak, and The Roadless Yaak, a collection of essays about Bass's home, the Yaak valley of Northwestern Montana.

Photo of Rick Bass

Episode #18
In the back yard with Alison Hawthorne Deming

Alison Hawthorne Deming is the author of SCIENCE AND OTHER POEMS (LSU Press, 1994), selected by Gerald Stern for the Walt Whitman Award of the Academy of American Poets.  She is the author of two additional poetry books, THE MONARCHS: A POEM SEQUENCE (LSU, 1997), and GENIUS LOCI (Penguin, 2005).   Deming has also published three nonfiction books, TEMPORARY HOMELANDS (Mercury House, 1994; Picador USA, 1996), THE EDGES OF THE CIVILIZED WORLD (Picador USA, 1998), which was a finalist for the PEN Center West Award, and WRITING THE SACRED INTO THE REAL (Milkweed Editions 2001, Credo Series: Notable American Writers on Nature, Community and the Writer Life).  She currently is Professor in Creative Writing at the University of Arizona and lives near Aqua Caliente Hill in Tucson.

Episode #17
Release party for Nervous Systems.

Recorded live at The Pump House Regional Arts Center in La Crosse, Wisconsin, William Stobb reads from his National Poetry Series volume, Nervous Systems, now available from Penguin Books.

Episode #16
Hey.  Free Blackberries. Robert Hass's "Meditation at Lagunitas."

 
Robert Hass is the author of four books of poetry, Field Guide, Praise, Human Wishes, and Sun Under Wood, as well as a book of essays, Twentieth Century Pleasures.  In his tenure as United States Poet Laureate, Hass spent two years battling American illiteracy, armed with the mantra, "imagination makes communities." He crisscrossed the country speaking at Rotary Club meetings, raising money to organize conferences such as "Watershed," which brought together noted novelists, poets, and storytellers to talk about writing, nature, and community.  Hass's forthcoming books include Time and Materials, a poetry collection due out in fall, 2007, and Now and Then, a collection of his Washington Post articles.  Hass is Professor of English at the University of California Berkeley.

~Episode #15~
Postscript~Claudia Keelan on Postmodern Poetics.

~Episode #14~
Hegelian Shuffle, part 3 of 3-synthesis: A. R. Ammons.

Archie Randolph Ammons was born in 1926, in Whiteville, North Carolina, on the family farm his grandfather established. Ammons served in World War II, then earned a Biology degree from Wake Forest University. He became principal of an elementary school, then worked as an executive an a glass manufacturing firm. Later, he taught for many years at Cornell University. His numerous volumes of poetry were awarded such notable prizes as the Bollingen Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and two National Book Awards. He died of cancer in 2001.

~Episode #12~
Hegelian Shuffle, part 2 of 3-antithesis: Claudia Keelan's Utopic grammar.

Claudia Keelan's books include the 2004 collection The Devotion Field and Utopic (2000), both from Alice James Books, and The Secularist (1997, Univesity of Georgia Press). She teaches in the MFA International program at the University of Nevada Las Vegas. Her recent work can be found in the January / February issue of American Poetry Review. She shared the cover with Gertrude Stein.

~Episode #11~
Hegelian Shuffle, part 1 of 3-Thesis: Tom Montag

Tom Montag is a Midwestern regionalist poet and essayist, living in Fairwater, Wisconsin.  Montag's book publications include Curlew: Home (2001, Midday Moon), The Big Book of Ben Zen (2004, MWPH Books) and The Sweet Bite of Morning (2003, Juniper Press).  He is at work on a long term project, "Vagabond in the Middle."  Learn more at his blog.

~Episode #10~
Donald Revell: poems and songs from Arcady
(this episode is only available with iTunes)

~Episode #9~
Networked by Tao Lin
(with a brief note on the MLA offsite reading)

Tao Lin's site is Reader of Depressing Books. Tao is the author of This Emotion was a Little E-Book (Bear Parade), Today The Sky is Blue and White with Bright Blue Spots and a Small Pale Moon and I Will Destroy Our Relationship Today  (Bear Parade), You Are a Little Bit Happier than I Am (Action Books), Bed (Spring 2007, Melville House), and Eeeee Eee Eeee (Spring 2007, Melville House). Stop by www.mipoesias.com to read more of Tao Lin's work.
  

~Episode #8~
Interview with Brenda Hillman, Part 2 of 2
~Episode #7~
Interview with Brenda Hillman, Part 1 of 2

Photo credit: Forrest Gander
music credit: Andrzej Gasiorowski

~Episode #6~
Juliet Patterson’s The Truant Lover

Juliet Patterson’s first book of poems, The Truant Lover, was selected by Jean Valentine as the winner of the Nightboat Books Poetry Prize.  Her poems have appeared in many journals and zines, and have earned a number of awards.  She teaches poetry and creative writing in Minneapolis through the College of St. Catherine, Hamline University, The Loft Literary Center and the Perpich Center for Arts Education. She has worked with children teaching at John Hopkins University with the Center for Talented Youth and as a volunteer educator with the Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights, United Cambodian Association of Minnesota, the Walker Art Center and the Minneapolis Institute of Arts.

                                                                                                         music credit: Jillian Ann

~Episode #5~
Thankful for Echolalia

Deborah Bernhardt received a BA in English / Art History / Photography from Sarah Lawrence College and an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Arizona.  She has been a fellow at the Fine Arts Work Center, Provincetown, a Jay C. and Ruth Halls Fellow at the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing, a Writer-in-residence at Penn State Altoona, and a recipient of a Literary Arts Grant from the Wisconsin Arts Board.  She lives in Baraboo, Wisconsin.

~Episode #4~
Release Party for Lynch’s Inland Empire
(with poems by Mary Jo Bang and Michelle Noteboom)

~Episode # 3~
Interview with David Krump

David Krump attends the Master of Studies program in Creative Writing at Oxford University.  He is a 2006 Ruth Lilly Fellow from the Poetry Foundation.  His poems appear in Colorado Review, Verse, Cricket Online Review and other journals and zines, and in the chapbook Night is a Good Child.  Krump lives in La Crosse, Wisconsin, where he co-curates, with William Stobb, the monthly reading series at the Pump House Regional Arts Center.
 

~EPISODE #1~
EARLY DEAN YOUNG ~ OCTOBER 10, 2006

William Stobb lives in La Crosse, Wisconsin, where he teaches writing classes at Viterbo University and co-curates, along with David Krump, the monthly reading series at The Pump House Regional Arts Center.  His poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, Colorado Review, Denver Quarterly, MiPOesias, Three Candles, and other journals.  His collection Nervous Systems is a 2006 National Poetry Series Selection.

HARD TO SAY is a broadcast for miPOradio: where poetry tunes in....

produced by didi menendez

www.miporadio.com