Alamo Drafthouse South Lamar
Poetry Is for the Sake of the Life
RECEIVED Tue., May 23, 2006
Dear Editor,
Last week, America lost one of her finest poets. Stanley Kunitz was 100 years old. He had served as U.S. poet laureate and had won the National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize. He was chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, founder of the Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center and New York’s Poets House, and mentor to many younger poets. Even as a centenarian, he continued to read publicly. I knew him briefly, and I will miss him dearly.
In his work to encourage young writers, Kunitz has been an example to me. I run the Joynes Reading Room, a center for creative writing at UT. We maintain a library of contemporary literature, and we bring authors to campus to mentor students. Unfortunately, few students utilize these resources. Our space is used more often as a study lounge than as a poetry salon.
I had hoped to consult Stanley once more for guidance. How does one convince students that poetry matters? Recently, I revisited his books and found much advice. “Poetry is for the sake of the life,” Kunitz wrote – not the other way around. As deeply as he cared for poetry, he understood that it is meaningful only to a fraction of the population. Kunitz created resources to support poets, not to propagate poetry to the masses.
Perhaps I shouldn’t be an evangelist, trying to convince the uninterested that poetry should matter, but rather a guide to that small group of students who have already embraced it. A few enthusiastic young writers attend our events every month. To some students, poetry may be inconsequential, but to these few, the value of poetry is immeasurable – a uniquely personal and expressive medium for describing the world. I’ll encourage them to read Kunitz’s Collected Poems, where they’ll find a century of experience and wisdom.
Last week, America lost one of her finest poets. Stanley Kunitz was 100 years old. He had served as U.S. poet laureate and had won the National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize. He was chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, founder of the Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center and New York’s Poets House, and mentor to many younger poets. Even as a centenarian, he continued to read publicly. I knew him briefly, and I will miss him dearly.
In his work to encourage young writers, Kunitz has been an example to me. I run the Joynes Reading Room, a center for creative writing at UT. We maintain a library of contemporary literature, and we bring authors to campus to mentor students. Unfortunately, few students utilize these resources. Our space is used more often as a study lounge than as a poetry salon.
I had hoped to consult Stanley once more for guidance. How does one convince students that poetry matters? Recently, I revisited his books and found much advice. “Poetry is for the sake of the life,” Kunitz wrote – not the other way around. As deeply as he cared for poetry, he understood that it is meaningful only to a fraction of the population. Kunitz created resources to support poets, not to propagate poetry to the masses.
Perhaps I shouldn’t be an evangelist, trying to convince the uninterested that poetry should matter, but rather a guide to that small group of students who have already embraced it. A few enthusiastic young writers attend our events every month. To some students, poetry may be inconsequential, but to these few, the value of poetry is immeasurable – a uniquely personal and expressive medium for describing the world. I’ll encourage them to read Kunitz’s Collected Poems, where they’ll find a century of experience and wisdom.
Matt Valentine
