tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-238119262011-10-22T14:17:33.566-04:00Poetry - whatever strikes me. Favorite poets, those I feel are understudied and underappreciated; or just those I feel that everyone should read.C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.comBlogger161100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-52516578235138554492011-10-22T14:12:00.002-04:002011-10-22T14:17:33.609-04:00

Last Sunday, the big, hairy man gave the old lady a push and they ran four miles together. She had on a brace for her ankle, but it hurt more than the running. Since then, we've done another nine miles throughout the week. Today, we were able to get about six miles done... 5.81 to be exact- without stopping.I am pretty proud of the lady for not stopping and getting the higher mileage on. It

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-83083046751465597122007-09-21T23:41:00.000-04:002007-09-21T23:59:14.826-04:00

Christina G. Rossetti was among the foremost poets of Victorian England. While in her lifetime, she was overshadowed by her more flamboyant brother, Dante Gabriel, the cloistered Rossetti's poetry is now recognized as among the most dramatic and stylistically innovative of her time. Among women of the period, she is perhaps outperformed only by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Best known for "

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-17061569563474421492007-03-18T16:14:00.000-04:002007-03-18T16:34:13.970-04:00

Bierce (1842-1914) was unsentimental, critical, sardonic, and lucid when sappy, romantic sentimentalism was at its most popular, a trait that has kept his writing (along with that of Melville [ LINK ], who had to be rediscovered, and a few others) current while consigning many of his more popular contemporaries to dust in recent years. It also earned him the nickname "Bitter Bierce," notable

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-62007344515742268442007-01-22T10:40:00.000-05:002007-01-22T10:49:17.982-05:00

Marie Ponsot, bilingual in French and English, lived in Europe and North Africa, worked as a translator of children's literature before coming to the US to teach at Queens College in NY.Communion of Saints: The Poor Bastard Under the BridgeThe arrows of the narrow moon flock down directInto that looking heart by Seine walls unprotected.Moonward the eyes of that hurt head still willStare and

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-1160667943262218142006-10-12T11:06:00.000-04:002006-11-07T11:37:14.818-05:00

Flamboyant, witty, and linguistically masterful, Oscar Wilde was a dramatic genius whose comedies are still noted as containing some of the most brilliant dialogue ever written for the stage. He was born into a prominent Anglo-Irish family in Dublin in 1854, and while at Oxford, became acquainted with the inimitable John Ruskin. His sole novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, was published in 1891;

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-1154473127236802192006-08-01T18:57:00.000-04:002006-11-07T11:37:14.749-05:00

John Keats, while underappreciated and harshly criticized during his very brief life (Oct. 31, 1795-Feb. 23, 1821), is now widely recognized as one of the greatest poets of the British Romantic movement, with which such giants as Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Blake are associated. Though most are familiar with his work, I think that occasionally we ought to read the works of a master. Below are a

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-1153265347882678662006-07-18T19:22:00.000-04:002006-11-07T11:37:14.689-05:00

John Berryman was born John Smith in MacAlester, Oklahoma, in 1914. He received an undergraduate degree from Columbia College in 1936 and attended Cambridge University on a fellowship. He taught at Wayne State University in Detroit and went on to occupy posts at Harvard and Princeton. From 1955 until his death in 1972, he was a professor at the University of Minnesota. Berryman is best

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-1151340330398349442006-06-26T12:35:00.000-04:002006-11-07T11:37:14.625-05:00

Dr. Lisk is one of the finest educators I've ever met. He is also one hell of an underappreciated poet. Here are some of his best. I hope you like them.Metaphors and Sausage[Link]After a long search we chose a new father.From more than a hundredletters of application and résumés,we determined twelvewe wanted to know in careful detail.From the dozen dossiers,we chose a brace of five to speak to

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-1148883858123640502006-05-29T00:48:00.000-04:002006-11-07T11:37:14.567-05:00

Dear Dad,This is a thank you, an apology, and an epiphany. For years, I've jokingly claimed that when I was twelve, your IQ began dropping to somewhere around the level at which you were able to keep breathing, but that was about it; however, around twenty, it miraculously began recovering with each passing day. I never understood. I never understood how it had to hurt you to watch me make my

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-1146750095630593482006-05-04T09:20:00.000-04:002006-11-07T11:37:14.508-05:00

Ransom (1888-1975) is best remembered as the literary critic who originally coined the term "New Criticism"; however, his poetic output, although small, includes some absolute works of genius. He is probably one of the finest "Major Minor Poets" produced by 20th century America.Winter RememberedTwo evils, monstrous either one apart,Possessed me, and were long and loath at going:A cry of Absence,

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-1145304551169834512006-04-17T16:08:00.000-04:002006-11-07T11:37:14.451-05:00

If you haven't yet, please read the Introduction to Wallace Stevens, which will provide bibliographic and biographical data about the poet, as well as some insight into his often difficult verse. The selections for today are all from his first collection, Harmonium, published in 1923.From Harmonium: Stevens's first collection.In the CarolinasThe lilacs wither in the Carolinas.Already the

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-1145304502601672822006-04-17T15:52:00.000-04:002006-11-07T11:37:14.397-05:00

Wallace Stevens - (1878-1955) - Stevens was one of the few great practicing poets to have ever lived who had a day job beyond writing. His first work, Harmonium, appeared at the dawn of the early surge in Modernist poetry - when the movement was at its earliest peak. It received a rather lukewarm reception; however, a spate of great Modernist works appearing between 1922-24 provides much

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-1145018861066367842006-04-14T08:37:00.000-04:002006-11-07T11:37:14.339-05:00

I think that it's time for my favorite from e. e. cummings. You'll know why when you read it."I Sing of Olaf Glad and Big"i sing of Olaf glad and bigwhose warmest heart recoiled at war:a conscientious object-orhis wellbelovéd colonel (trigwestpointer most succinctly bred)took erring Olaf soon in hand;but--through an host of overjoyednoncoms (first knocking on the headhim) do through icy waters

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-1143147868807763652006-03-23T15:50:00.000-05:002006-11-07T11:37:14.286-05:00

Of the many Harlem Renaissance poets we still study, Countee Cullen (1903-1946) remained technically closer to the poetic conventions of English Literature; in doing so he transcended his role as the "poet of the people" and became solely "the poet." In addition to poetry, he wrote fiction and children's stories, and edited an important early anthology of slave verse, Caroling Dusk (1927). He

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-1142436228904280352006-03-15T09:56:00.000-05:002006-11-07T11:37:14.229-05:00

John Wilmot, Second Earl of Rochester (1647-1680) - He was one of the rowdiest drunken fools of the seventeenth Century. He was also one of the most talented - he received his Master of Arts from Oxford at age fourteen, more common then than now, but still a sign of amazing ability. He drank, whored, vandalized, and walked around naked in public. I've included some of his more bawdy poetry in

C.Berghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01428748769620647787noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23811926.post-1141998948392053832006-03-10T08:38:00.000-05:002006-11-07T11:37:14.176-05:00

Aside from Moby Dick, "Bartleby the Scrivener" (that staple of American Literature Survey courses), and Billy Budd, the works of Herman Melville are largely ignored. He was probably the most profound fiction writer of the American Romantic movement. His writing career began with the bestselling adventure novels Typee, Omoo, and Mardi. After the huge success of these, he began to delve deeper

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